Cannot fetch latest CLI version on npmjs to check if up-to-d

Error message

Cannot fetch latest CLI version on npmjs to check if up-to-date: ${e}

What it means

checkVersionSafe compares the installed CLI version against the latest wmill version on npmjs. When the npmjs fetch throws (network failure, DNS, proxy, rate limit), the catch prints this console.warn with the underlying error and the command continues normally — only the up-to-date/outdated notice is lost.

Source

Thrown at cli/src/main.ts:238

  .command("datatable", datatable)
  .command("pipeline", pipeline)
  .command("ducklake", ducklake)
  .command("object-storage", objectStorage)
  .command("version --version", "Show version information")
  .action(async (opts: any) => {
    console.log("CLI version: " + VERSION);
    try {
      const provider = new NpmProvider({ package: "windmill-cli" });
      const versions = await provider.getVersions("windmill-cli");
      if (versions.latest !== VERSION) {
        console.log(
          `CLI is outdated. Latest version ${versions.latest} is available. Run \`wmill upgrade\` to update.`
        );
      } else {
        console.log("CLI is up to date");
      }
    } catch (e) {
      console.warn(
        `Cannot fetch latest CLI version on npmjs to check if up-to-date: ${e}`
      );
    }
    const workspace = await getActiveWorkspace(opts as GlobalOptions);
    if (workspace) {
      try {
        const backendVersion = await fetchVersion(workspace.remote);
        console.log("Backend Version: " + backendVersion);
      } catch (e) {
        console.warn(
          `Cannot fetch backend version from ${workspace.remote} (workspace: ${workspace.name}): ${e}`
        );
      }
    } else {
      console.warn(
        "Cannot fetch backend version: no active workspace selected, choose one to pick a remote to fetch version of"
      );
    }

View on GitHub (pinned to e474e8803c)

Solutions

Restore network access to registry.npmjs.org or configure HTTPS_PROXY/HTTP_PROXY.
Skip the check intentionally via the CLI's no-version-check env option (e.g. WMILL/no version check env var) in offline environments.
Check npm status (npmjs status page) if the error mentions HTTP 5xx.
Ignore the warning; it does not affect command execution.

Example fix

// before
wmill sync push
// Cannot fetch latest CLI version on npmjs to check if up-to-date: TypeError: fetch failed

// after
export HTTPS_PROXY=http://proxy.corp.internal:3128
wmill sync push

Defensive patterns

Strategy: try-catch

Validate before calling

try {
  const res = await fetch("https://registry.npmjs.org/wmill/latest", { signal: AbortSignal.timeout(3000) });
  console.log("npm reachable:", res.ok);
} catch (e) {
  console.log("npm unreachable, up-to-date check will be skipped:", e);
}

Try / catch

try {
  await $`wmill sync push`;
} catch (e) {
  if (!String(e).includes("Cannot fetch latest CLI version")) throw e;
  // ignore version-check noise; the sync itself succeeded
}

Prevention

Ensure egress to registry.npmjs.org or set HTTPS_PROXY/HTTP_PROXY
Disable the version check explicitly in offline environments rather than letting it fail
Pin wmill versions in CI so the up-to-date notice is irrelevant
Watch for 429/5xx from npm during outages

When it happens

Trigger: Any command that triggers the npm version check (e.g. `wmill sync`, most commands) when the request to registry.npmjs.org fails: no internet, blocked egress, proxy misconfig, npm outage, or invalid WINDMILL-version-check environment overrides.

Common situations: CI runners without npmjs access; offline development; corporate firewalls; npmjs returning 429/5xx; IPv6 breakage on the host.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of windmill-labs/windmill@e474e8803c (2026-09-03). Data as JSON: /api/errors/6fff46e7fa1c0534. Report an issue: GitHub.