file-saver

What is file-saver?

The file-saver package is a solution for client-side file saving. It allows web applications to save files on the client's computer, effectively generating files based on data within the browser. This can be useful for applications that need to export reports, download documents, or save user-generated content without sending data back to a server.

What are file-saver's main functionalities?

Saving text files

This feature allows you to save text files. The code sample demonstrates saving a simple text file named 'hello_world.txt' with the content 'Hello, world!'.

saveAs(new Blob(['Hello, world!'], {type: 'text/plain;charset=utf-8'}), 'hello_world.txt');

Saving binary files

This feature enables the saving of binary files, such as images or documents, in a binary format. The code sample shows how to save a binary file named 'example.bin'.

saveAs(new Blob([binaryData], {type: 'application/octet-stream'}), 'example.bin');

Other packages similar to file-saver

js-file-download

js-file-download is a package for triggering browser downloads from JavaScript. It's simpler and has fewer features than file-saver, focusing mainly on triggering downloads by creating and clicking a hidden link with the file URL.

README

If you need to save really large files bigger than the blob's size limitation or don't have enough RAM, then have a look at the more advanced StreamSaver.js that can save data directly to the hard drive asynchronously with the power of the new streams API. That will have support for progress, cancelation and knowing when it's done writing

FileSaver.js

FileSaver.js is the solution to saving files on the client-side, and is perfect for web apps that generates files on the client, However if the file is coming from the server we recommend you to first try to use Content-Disposition attachment response header as it has more cross-browser compatiblity.

Looking for canvas.toBlob() for saving canvases? Check out canvas-toBlob.js for a cross-browser implementation.

Supported Browsers

Browser	Constructs as	Filenames	Max Blob Size	Dependencies
Firefox 20+	Blob	Yes	800 MiB	None
Firefox < 20	data: URI	No	n/a	Blob.js
Chrome	Blob	Yes	2GB	None
Chrome for Android	Blob	Yes	RAM/5	None
Edge	Blob	Yes	?	None
IE 10+	Blob	Yes	600 MiB	None
Opera 15+	Blob	Yes	500 MiB	None
Opera < 15	data: URI	No	n/a	Blob.js
Safari 6.1+*	Blob	No	?	None
Safari < 6	data: URI	No	n/a	Blob.js
Safari 10.1+	Blob	Yes	n/a	None

Feature detection is possible:

try {
    var isFileSaverSupported = !!new Blob;
} catch (e) {}

IE < 10

It is possible to save text files in IE < 10 without Flash-based polyfills. See ChenWenBrian and koffsyrup's saveTextAs() for more details.

Safari 6.1+

Blobs may be opened instead of saved sometimes—you may have to direct your Safari users to manually press ⌘+S to save the file after it is opened. Using the application/octet-stream MIME type to force downloads can cause issues in Safari.

iOS

saveAs must be run within a user interaction event such as onTouchDown or onClick; setTimeout will prevent saveAs from triggering. Due to restrictions in iOS saveAs opens in a new window instead of downloading, if you want this fixed please tell Apple how this WebKit bug is affecting you.

Syntax

Import saveAs() from file-saver

import { saveAs } from 'file-saver';

FileSaver saveAs(Blob/File/Url, optional DOMString filename, optional Object { autoBom })

Pass { autoBom: true } if you want FileSaver.js to automatically provide Unicode text encoding hints (see: byte order mark). Note that this is only done if your blob type has charset=utf-8 set.

Examples

Saving text using require()

var FileSaver = require('file-saver');
var blob = new Blob(["Hello, world!"], {type: "text/plain;charset=utf-8"});
FileSaver.saveAs(blob, "hello world.txt");

Saving text

var blob = new Blob(["Hello, world!"], {type: "text/plain;charset=utf-8"});
FileSaver.saveAs(blob, "hello world.txt");

Saving URLs

FileSaver.saveAs("https://httpbin.org/image", "image.jpg");

Using URLs within the same origin will just use a[download]. Otherwise, it will first check if it supports cors header with a synchronous head request. If it does, it will download the data and save using blob URLs. If not, it will try to download it using a[download].

The standard W3C File API Blob interface is not available in all browsers. Blob.js is a cross-browser Blob implementation that solves this.

Saving a canvas

var canvas = document.getElementById("my-canvas");
canvas.toBlob(function(blob) {
    saveAs(blob, "pretty image.png");
});

Note: The standard HTML5 canvas.toBlob() method is not available in all browsers. canvas-toBlob.js is a cross-browser canvas.toBlob() that polyfills this.

Saving File

You can save a File constructor without specifying a filename. If the file itself already contains a name, there is a hand full of ways to get a file instance (from storage, file input, new constructor, clipboard event). If you still want to change the name, then you can change it in the 2nd argument.

// Note: Ie and Edge don't support the new File constructor,
// so it's better to construct blobs and use saveAs(blob, filename)
var file = new File(["Hello, world!"], "hello world.txt", {type: "text/plain;charset=utf-8"});
FileSaver.saveAs(file);

Installation

# Basic Node.JS installation
npm install file-saver --save
bower install file-saver

Additionally, TypeScript definitions can be installed via:

# Additional typescript definitions
npm install @types/file-saver --save-dev