The module object

In each module, the module free variable is a reference to the object representing the current module. For convenience, module.exports is also accessible via the exports module-global. module is not actually a global but rather local to each module.

The module objects required for the first time by this one.

The module.exports object is created by the Module system. Sometimes this is not acceptable; many want their module to be an instance of some class. To do this, assign the desired export object to module.exports. Assigning the desired object to exports will simply rebind the local exports variable, which is probably not what is desired.

For example, suppose we were making a module called a.js:

const EventEmitter = require('node:events');

module.exports = new EventEmitter();

// Do some work, and after some time emit
// the 'ready' event from the module itself.
setTimeout(() => {
  module.exports.emit('ready');
}, 1000);

Then in another file we could do:

const a = require('./a');
a.on('ready', () => {
  console.log('module "a" is ready');
});

Assignment to module.exports must be done immediately. It cannot be done in any callbacks. This does not work:

x.js:

setTimeout(() => {
  module.exports = { a: 'hello' };
}, 0);

y.js:

const x = require('./x');
console.log(x.a);

The exports variable is available within a module's file-level scope, and is assigned the value of module.exports before the module is evaluated.

It allows a shortcut, so that module.exports.f = ... can be written more succinctly as exports.f = .... However, be aware that like any variable, if a new value is assigned to exports, it is no longer bound to module.exports:

module.exports.hello = true; // Exported from require of module
exports = { hello: false };  // Not exported, only available in the module

When the module.exports property is being completely replaced by a new object, it is common to also reassign exports:

module.exports = exports = function Constructor() {
  // ... etc.
};

To illustrate the behavior, imagine this hypothetical implementation of require(), which is quite similar to what is actually done by require():

function require(/* ... */) {
  const module = { exports: {} };
  ((module, exports) => {
    // Module code here. In this example, define a function.
    function someFunc() {}
    exports = someFunc;
    // At this point, exports is no longer a shortcut to module.exports, and
    // this module will still export an empty default object.
    module.exports = someFunc;
    // At this point, the module will now export someFunc, instead of the
    // default object.
  })(module, module.exports);
  return module.exports;
}

The fully resolved filename of the module.

The identifier for the module. Typically this is the fully resolved filename.

Whether or not the module is done loading, or is in the process of loading.

The module that first required this one, or null if the current module is the entry point of the current process, or undefined if the module was loaded by something that is not a CommonJS module (E.G.: REPL or import).

The directory name of the module. This is usually the same as the path.dirname() of the module.id.

The search paths for the module.

module.require(id): any

The module.require() method provides a way to load a module as if require() was called from the original module.

In order to do this, it is necessary to get a reference to the module object. Since require() returns the module.exports, and the module is typically only available within a specific module's code, it must be explicitly exported in order to be used.