How to Run TypeScript Directly in Node.js with Erasable Syntax

Install Node.js 23.6+ (or 22.6+ with --experimental-strip-types ) and TypeScript 5.8+.

Add "erasableSyntaxOnly": true and "verbatimModuleSyntax": true to your tsconfig.json compiler options.

Set "module": "nodenext" and "noEmit": true in tsconfig.json .

Replace all enum declarations with as const objects and derived union types.

Convert constructor parameter properties to explicit property declarations and assignments.

Refactor value-bearing namespace blocks into standard ES module exports.

Run your TypeScript files directly with node src/server.ts — no build step required.

Verify type safety by running tsc --noEmit in CI, since Node.js strips types without checking them.

TypeScript 5.8 introduced the --erasableSyntaxOnly compiler flag, which validates whether TypeScript code contains only type constructs that can be stripped away without altering runtime behavior.…