---
title: Specify your Node.js version for the Azure Static Web App GitHub Action
slug: specify-your-nodejs-version-for-the-azure-static-web-app-github-action
description: Learn how to specify the Node.js version for the Azure/static-web-apps-deploy GitHub action.
author: Tim Deschryver
date: 2022-06-03
tags: GitHub Actions, DevOps, Azure
---

While migrating my [blog](https://timdeschryver.dev/) to an [Azure Static Web App](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/static-web-apps/), I encountered a minor issue that occured during the build process within the GitHub workflow.

I created the Azure Static Web App via the Azure Portal (you can also use the [VSCode Extension](https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=ms-azuretools.vscode-azurestaticwebapps), or the [Azure CLI](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/static-web-apps/get-started-cli?tabs=vanilla-javascript)), which automatically created a [GitHub workflow (azure-static-web-apps-salmon-rock-0fb035b03.yml)](https://github.com/timdeschryver/timdeschryver.dev/blob/main/.github/workflows/azure-static-web-apps-salmon-rock-0fb035b03.yml) on my GitHub repository.

The worflow uses the [Azure/static-web-apps-deploy](https://github.com/Azure/static-web-apps-deploy) GitHub action to build and deploy the application, and was already [pre-configured](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/static-web-apps/configuration).

The problem I encountered was that my blog required a different Node.js version than the one that was used by the action.
The action was using the default Node.js version (14.x), while my blog required version 16.x.

![The GitHub Action uses Node.js v14.x by default](./images/before.png)

Because the GitHub action doesn't support specifying a Node.js version, the solution is to specify the Node.js version within the `package.json` file.
To do this, use the [`engines`](https://docs.npmjs.com/cli/v8/configuring-npm/package-json#engines) field.

```json:package.json
{
	"engines": {
		"node": "^16.0.0"
	}
}
```

![The GitHub Action uses Node.js v16.x after we specified the node version in the package.json](./images/after.png)