Syntax highlighting
Modern JavaScript libraries for syntax highlighting code blocks in docs, blogs, and web apps. This list focuses on projects that are both widely used and actively maintained.
Quick recommendation
Section titled “Quick recommendation”- Use Shiki for static docs and SSR output with VS Code-like quality.
- Use Prism when you need a lightweight client-side highlighter with many plugins.
- Use Highlight.js for easy setup and automatic language detection.
- Use @wooorm/starry-night if you want GitHub-style highlighting based on TextMate grammars.
- Use Sugar High only for minimal JS/JSX snippets where tiny bundle size matters.
Maintained packages (snapshot 2026-04-10)
Section titled “Maintained packages (snapshot 2026-04-10)”| Package | Best for | Maintenance signal | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shiki | SSG/SSR docs, MDX pipelines | npm 4.0.2, updated 2026-03; repo active (2026-03) | High accuracy (TextMate + VS Code themes), strong for build-time highlighting |
| Prism | Browser-side highlighting | npm 1.30.0, updated 2025-03; repo active (2026-04) | Lightweight and extensible ecosystem |
| Highlight.js | Auto-detection and quick integration | npm 11.11.1, updated 2025-08; repo active (2025-10) | Mature, very widely adopted |
| @wooorm/starry-night | GitHub-like rendering | npm 3.9.0, updated 2026-01; repo active (2026-01) | High-fidelity tokenizer, good for Markdown tooling |
| refractor | Prism AST output (rehype/unified) | npm 5.0.0, updated 2025-03; repo active (2025-03) | Better if you need syntax tree output, not raw HTML strings |
| lowlight | highlight.js AST output | npm 3.3.0, updated 2024-12; repo active (2024-12) | Good with virtual DOM and unified pipelines |
| Sugar High | Tiny JS/JSX snippets | npm 1.1.0, updated 2026-04; repo active (2026-04) | Extremely small footprint, narrower language scope |
- For full in-browser editing (not just highlighting), see Embeddable editors.
- If you need deterministic output for docs, prefer build-time highlighting (Shiki / starry-night) over runtime highlighting.
Sources
Section titled “Sources”- Shiki documentation — project scope and capabilities (accessed 2026-04-10)
- Prism website — project scope and plugin ecosystem (accessed 2026-04-10)
- Highlight.js website — project scope and usage model (accessed 2026-04-10)
- npm: shiki, npm: prismjs, npm: highlight.js, npm: @wooorm/starry-night, npm: refractor, npm: lowlight, npm: sugar-high — latest version and last modified date (accessed 2026-04-10)
- GitHub: shikijs/shiki, PrismJS/prism, highlightjs/highlight.js, wooorm/starry-night, wooorm/refractor, wooorm/lowlight, huozhi/sugar-high — repository activity and popularity signals (accessed 2026-04-10)