bun.sh/docs/cli/create.md

Template a new Bun project with bun create.

$ bun create <template> <destination>

{% callout %} Note — You don’t need bun create to use Bun. You don’t need any configuration at all. This command exists to make getting started a bit quicker and easier. {% /callout %}

A template can take a number of forms:

$ bun create <template>         # an official template (remote)
$ bun create <username>/<repo>  # a GitHub repo (remote)
$ bun create <local-template>   # a custom template (local)

Running bun create performs the following steps:

• Download the template (remote templates only)
• Copy all template files into the destination folder. By default Bun will not overwrite any existing files. Use the --force flag to overwrite existing files.
• Install dependencies with bun install.
• Initialize a fresh Git repo. Opt out with the --no-git flag.
• Run the template's configured start script, if defined.

Official templates

The following official templates are available.

bun create next ./myapp
bun create react ./myapp
bun create svelte-kit ./myapp
bun create elysia ./myapp
bun create hono ./myapp
bun create kingworld ./myapp

Each of these corresponds to a directory in the bun-community/create-templates repo. If you think a major framework is missing, please open a PR there. This list will change over time as additional examples are added. To see an up-to-date list, run bun create with no arguments.

$ bun create
Welcome to bun! Create a new project by pasting any of the following:
  <list of templates>

{% callout %} ⚡️ Speed — At the time of writing, bun create react app runs ~11x faster on a M1 Macbook Pro than yarn create react-app app. {% /callout %}

GitHub repos

A template of the form <username>/<repo> will be downloaded from GitHub.

$ bun create ahfarmer/calculator ./myapp

Complete GitHub URLs will also work:

$ bun create github.com/ahfarmer/calculator ./myapp
$ bun create https://github.com/ahfarmer/calculator ./myapp

Bun installs the files as they currently exist current default branch (usually main). Unlike git clone it doesn't download the commit history or configure a remote.

Local templates

{% callout %} ⚠️ Warning — Unlike remote templates, running bun create with a local template will delete the entire destination folder if it already exists! Be careful. {% /callout %} Bun's templater can be extended to support custom templates defined on your local file system. These templates should live in one of the following directories:

• $HOME/.bun-create/<name>: global templates
• <project root>/.bun-create/<name>: project-specific templates

{% callout %} Note — You can customize the global template path by setting the BUN_CREATE_DIR environment variable. {% /callout %}

To create a local template, navigate to $HOME/.bun-create and create a new directory with the desired name of your template.

$ cd $HOME/.bun-create
$ mkdir foo
$ cd foo

Then, create a package.json file in that directory with the following contents:

{
  "name": "foo"
}

You can run bun create foo elsewhere on your file system to verify that Bun is correctly finding your local template.

{% table %}

---

• postinstall
• runs after installing dependencies

---

• preinstall
• runs before installing dependencies

{% /table %}

Each of these can correspond to a string or array of strings. An array of commands will be executed in order. Here is an example:

{
  "name": "@bun-examples/simplereact",
  "version": "0.0.1",
  "main": "index.js",
  "dependencies": {
    "react": "^17.0.2",
    "react-dom": "^17.0.2"
  },
  "bun-create": {
    "postinstall": "echo 'Installing...'", // a single command
    "postinstall": ["echo 'Done!'"], // an array of commands
    "start": "bun run echo 'Hello world!'"
  }
}

When cloning a template, bun create will automatically remove the "bun-create" section from package.json before writing it to the destination folder.

Reference

CLI flags

{% table %}

• Flag
• Description

---

• --force
• Overwrite existing files

---

• --no-install
• Skip installing node_modules & tasks

---

• --no-git
• Don’t initialize a git repository

---

• --open
• Start & open in-browser after finish

{% /table %}

Environment variables

{% table %}

• Name
• Description

---

• GITHUB_API_DOMAIN
• If you’re using a GitHub enterprise or a proxy, you can customize the GitHub domain Bun pings for downloads

---

• GITHUB_API_TOKEN
• This lets bun create work with private repositories or if you get rate-limited

{% /table %}

{% details summary="How bun create works" %}

When you run bun create ${template} ${destination}, here’s what happens:

IF remote template

1. GET registry.npmjs.org/@bun-examples/${template}/latest and parse it

2. GET registry.npmjs.org/@bun-examples/${template}/-/${template}-${latestVersion}.tgz

3. Decompress & extract ${template}-${latestVersion}.tgz into ${destination}

   • If there are files that would overwrite, warn and exit unless --force is passed

IF GitHub repo

1. Download the tarball from GitHub’s API

2. Decompress & extract into ${destination}

   • If there are files that would overwrite, warn and exit unless --force is passed

ELSE IF local template

1. Open local template folder

2. Delete destination directory recursively

3. Copy files recursively using the fastest system calls available (on macOS fcopyfile and Linux, copy_file_range). Do not copy or traverse into node_modules folder if exists (this alone makes it faster than cp)

4. Parse the package.json (again!), update name to be ${basename(destination)}, remove the bun-create section from the package.json and save the updated package.json to disk.

   • IF Next.js is detected, add bun-framework-next to the list of dependencies
   • IF Create React App is detected, add the entry point in /src/index.{js,jsx,ts,tsx} to public/index.html
   • IF Relay is detected, add bun-macro-relay so that Relay works

5. Auto-detect the npm client, preferring pnpm, yarn (v1), and lastly npm

6. Run any tasks defined in "bun-create": { "preinstall" } with the npm client

7. Run ${npmClient} install unless --no-install is passed OR no dependencies are in package.json

8. Run any tasks defined in "bun-create": { "preinstall" } with the npm client

9. Run git init; git add -A .; git commit -am "Initial Commit";

   • Rename gitignore to .gitignore. NPM automatically removes .gitignore files from appearing in packages.
   • If there are dependencies, this runs in a separate thread concurrently while node_modules are being installed
   • Using libgit2 if available was tested and performed 3x slower in microbenchmarks

{% /details %}