gulp-sass

What is gulp-sass?

The gulp-sass package is a Gulp plugin that allows you to compile Sass (Syntactically Awesome Stylesheets) files into CSS. It integrates seamlessly with Gulp, a toolkit for automating painful or time-consuming tasks in your development workflow.

What are gulp-sass's main functionalities?

Compile Sass to CSS

This feature allows you to compile Sass files into CSS. The code sample demonstrates a Gulp task that takes all .scss files from the src/scss directory, compiles them into CSS, and outputs them to the dist/css directory.

const gulp = require('gulp');
const sass = require('gulp-sass')(require('sass'));

gulp.task('sass', function() {
  return gulp.src('./src/scss/**/*.scss')
    .pipe(sass().on('error', sass.logError))
    .pipe(gulp.dest('./dist/css'));
});

Watch for changes

This feature allows you to watch for changes in your Sass files and automatically compile them to CSS whenever a change is detected. The code sample demonstrates a Gulp task that watches the src/scss directory for changes and runs the 'sass' task whenever a change is detected.

const gulp = require('gulp');
const sass = require('gulp-sass')(require('sass'));

gulp.task('sass', function() {
  return gulp.src('./src/scss/**/*.scss')
    .pipe(sass().on('error', sass.logError))
    .pipe(gulp.dest('./dist/css'));
});

gulp.task('watch', function() {
  gulp.watch('./src/scss/**/*.scss', gulp.series('sass'));
});

Source Maps

This feature allows you to generate source maps for your compiled CSS files, which can be useful for debugging. The code sample demonstrates a Gulp task that initializes source maps, compiles Sass to CSS, writes the source maps to a maps directory, and outputs the CSS to the dist/css directory.

const gulp = require('gulp');
const sass = require('gulp-sass')(require('sass'));
const sourcemaps = require('gulp-sourcemaps');

gulp.task('sass', function() {
  return gulp.src('./src/scss/**/*.scss')
    .pipe(sourcemaps.init())
    .pipe(sass().on('error', sass.logError))
    .pipe(sourcemaps.write('./maps'))
    .pipe(gulp.dest('./dist/css'));
});

Other packages similar to gulp-sass

node-sass

node-sass is a library that provides binding for Node.js to LibSass, the C version of the popular stylesheet preprocessor, Sass. It can be used independently or integrated into build tools like Gulp or Grunt. Compared to gulp-sass, node-sass is more low-level and requires additional setup to integrate with Gulp.

sass

sass is the official Dart implementation of Sass, which is the primary implementation used by the Sass team. It can be used with Node.js and is often preferred for its speed and compatibility with the latest Sass features. Like node-sass, it can be integrated into Gulp but requires additional configuration.

gulp-less

gulp-less is a Gulp plugin for compiling Less files to CSS. While it serves a similar purpose to gulp-sass, it is specifically designed for Less, another CSS preprocessor. It offers similar functionality but is not compatible with Sass files.

README

gulp-sass

Sass plugin for Gulp.

Before filing an issue, please make sure you have updated to the latest version of gulp-sass and have gone through our Common Issues and Their Fixes section.

Migrating your existing project to version 5? Please read our (short!) migration guide.

Support

Only Active LTS and Current releases are supported.

Installation

To use gulp-sass, you must install both gulp-sass itself and a Sass compiler. gulp-sass supports both Dart Sass and Node Sass, although Node Sass is deprecated. We recommend that you use Dart Sass for new projects, and migrate Node Sass projects to Dart Sass when possible.

Whichever compiler you choose, it's best to install these as dev dependencies:

npm install sass gulp-sass --save-dev

Importing it into your project

gulp-sass must be imported into your gulpfile, where you provide it the compiler of your choice. To use gulp-sass in a CommonJS module (which is most Node.js environments), do something like this:

const sass = require('gulp-sass')(require('sass'));

To use gulp-sass in an ECMAScript module (which is supported in newer Node.js 14 and later), do something like this:

import dartSass from 'sass';
import gulpSass from 'gulp-sass';
const sass = gulpSass(dartSass);

Usage

Note: These examples are written for CommonJS modules and assume you're using Gulp 4. For examples that work with Gulp 3, check the docs for an earlier version of gulp-sass.

gulp-sass must be used in a Gulp task. Your task can call sass() (to asynchronously render your CSS), or sass.sync() (to synchronously render your CSS). Then, export your task with the export keyword. We'll show some examples of how to do that.

⚠️ Note: When using Dart Sass, synchronous rendering is twice as fast as asynchronous rendering. The Sass team is exploring ways to improve asynchronous rendering with Dart Sass, but for now, you will get the best performance from sass.sync(). If performance is critical, you can use node-sass instead, but bear in mind that node-sass may not support modern Sass features you rely on.

Render your CSS

To render your CSS with a build task, then watch your files for changes, you might write something like this:

'use strict';

const gulp = require('gulp');
const sass = require('gulp-sass')(require('sass'));

function buildStyles() {
  return gulp.src('./sass/**/*.scss')
    .pipe(sass().on('error', sass.logError))
    .pipe(gulp.dest('./css'));
};

exports.buildStyles = buildStyles;
exports.watch = function () {
  gulp.watch('./sass/**/*.scss', ['sass']);
};

With synchronous rendering, that Gulp task looks like this:

function buildStyles() {
  return gulp.src('./sass/**/*.scss')
    .pipe(sass.sync().on('error', sass.logError))
    .pipe(gulp.dest('./css'));
};

Render with options

To change the final output of your CSS, you can pass an options object to your renderer. gulp-sass supports Node Sass's render options, with two unsupported exceptions:

• The data option, which is used by gulp-sass internally.
• The file option, which has undefined behavior that may change without notice.

For example, to compress your CSS, you can call sass({outputStyle: 'compressed'}. In the context of a Gulp task, that looks like this:

function buildStyles() {
  return gulp.src('./sass/**/*.scss')
    .pipe(sass({outputStyle: 'compressed'}).on('error', sass.logError))
    .pipe(gulp.dest('./css'));
};

exports.buildStyles = buildStyles;

Or this for synchronous rendering:

function buildStyles() {
  return gulp.src('./sass/**/*.scss')
    .pipe(sass.sync({outputStyle: 'compressed'}).on('error', sass.logError))
    .pipe(gulp.dest('./css'));
};

exports.buildStyles = buildStyles;

Include a source map

gulp-sass can be used in tandem with gulp-sourcemaps to generate source maps for the Sass-to-CSS compilation. You will need to initialize gulp-sourcemaps before running gulp-sass, and write the source maps after.

const sourcemaps = require('gulp-sourcemaps');

function buildStyles() {
  return gulp.src('./sass/**/*.scss')
    .pipe(sourcemaps.init())
    .pipe(sass().on('error', sass.logError))
    .pipe(sourcemaps.write())
    .pipe(gulp.dest('./css'));
}

exports.buildStyles = buildStyles;

By default, gulp-sourcemaps writes the source maps inline, in the compiled CSS files. To write them to a separate file, specify a path relative to the gulp.dest() destination in the sourcemaps.write() function.

const sourcemaps = require('gulp-sourcemaps');

function buildStyles() {
  return gulp.src('./sass/**/*.scss')
    .pipe(sourcemaps.init())
    .pipe(sass().on('error', sass.logError))
    .pipe(sourcemaps.write('./maps'))
    .pipe(gulp.dest('./css'));
};

exports.buildStyles = buildStyles;

Migrating to version 5

gulp-sass version 5 requires Node.js 12 or later, and introduces some breaking changes. Additionally, changes in Node.js itself mean that Node fibers can no longer be used to speed up Dart Sass in Node.js 16.

Setting a Sass compiler

As of version 5, gulp-sass does not include a default Sass compiler, so you must install one (either node-sass or sass) along with gulp-sass.

npm install sass gulp-sass --save-dev

Then, you must explicitly set that compiler in your gulpfille. Instead of setting a compiler prop on the gulp-sass instance, you pass the compiler into a function call when instantiating gulp-sass.

These changes look something like this:

- const sass = require('gulp-sass'));
- const compiler = require('sass');
- sass.compiler = compiler;
+ const sass = require('gulp-sass')(require('sass'));

If you're migrating an ECMAScript module, that'll look something like this:

import dartSass from 'sass';
- import sass from 'gulp-sass';
- sass.compiler = dartSass;

import dartSass from 'sass';
+ import gulpSass from 'gulp-sass';
+ const sass = gulpSass(dartSass);

What about fibers?

We used to recommend Node fibers as a way to speed up asynchronous rendering with Dart Sass. Unfortunately, Node fibers are discontinued and will not work in Node.js 16. The Sass team is exploring its options for future performance improvements, but for now, you will get the best performance from sass.sync().

Issues

gulp-sass is a light-weight wrapper around either Dart Sass or Node Sass (which in turn is a Node.js binding for LibSass. Because of this, the issue you're having likely isn't a gulp-sass issue, but an issue with one those projects or with Sass as a whole.

If you have a feature request/question about how Sass works/concerns on how your Sass gets compiled/errors in your compiling, it's likely a Dart Sass or LibSass issue and you should file your issue with one of those projects.

If you're having problems with the options you're passing in, it's likely a Dart Sass or Node Sass issue and you should file your issue with one of those projects.

We may, in the course of resolving issues, direct you to one of these other projects. If we do so, please follow up by searching that project's issue queue (both open and closed) for your problem and, if it doesn't exist, filing an issue with them.