Feedsmith
Fast, all‑in‑one JavaScript feed parser and generator for RSS, Atom, RDF, and JSON Feed, with support for popular namespaces and OPML files.
Feedsmith's universal and format-specific parsers turn each feed into an object that mirrors its original structure and maps legacy elements to their modern equivalents, so you read an old feed the same way as a new one.
[!IMPORTANT]
Feedsmith 3.0 is out! 🎉 It comes with a range of improvements and some breaking changes. Check out the migration guide to see what's new and how to upgrade from 2.x.
Read full docs ↗ · Quick Start · Why Feedsmith? · Benchmarks →
Features
Core
- Comprehensive support: Supports all major feed formats and namespaces.
- Preserves structure: Parsed feed object maintains the original feed structure making it easy to access the data.
- Smart namespace handling: Normalizes custom namespace prefixes to standard ones (e.g.,
dc.creator). - Parsing & generating: Use one package for both parsing and generating feeds.
Leniency
- Normalizes legacy elements: Upgrades feed elements to their modern equivalents so that you never need to worry about reading feeds in older formats.
- CaSe INSENsiTive: Handles fields and attributes in any case (lowercase, uppercase, mixed).
- Namespace URI tolerance: Accepts non-official namespace URIs (HTTPS variants, case variations, trailing slashes, whitespace).
- Forgiving: Gracefully handles malformed or incomplete feeds and extracts valid data. This makes it suitable for use with real-world feeds that may not strictly follow specifications.
Performance
- Ultrafast parsing: One of the fastest JavaScript feed parsers (see benchmarks).
- Type-safe API: Built with TypeScript from the ground up, it provides complete type definitions for every feed format and namespace.
- Tree-shakable: Only include the parts of the library you need, reducing bundle size.
- Well-tested: Comprehensive test suite with over 4000 tests and 99% code coverage.
Compatibility
- Works in Node.js and modern browsers.
- Supports both CommonJS and ES modules.
- Works with plain JavaScript, so you don't need TypeScript.
Supported Formats
Feedsmith aims to fully support all major feed formats and namespaces in complete alignment with their specs.
✅ Available · ⌛️ Work in progress · 📋 Planned
Feeds
| Format | Versions | Parse | Generate | |--------|----------|-------|----------| | RSS | 0.9x, 2.0 | ✅ | ✅ | | Atom | 0.3, 1.0 | ✅ | ✅ | | RDF | 0.9, 1.0 | ✅ | 📋 | | JSON Feed | 1.0, 1.1 | ✅ | ✅ |
Other
| Format | Versions | Parse | Generate | |--------|----------|-------|----------| | OPML | 1.0, 2.0 | ✅ | ✅ |
Feed Namespaces
| Name | Prefix | Supported in | Parse | Generate |
|------|---------|--------------|-------|----------|
| Atom |
Quick Start
This guide will get you up and running with Feedsmith in just a few minutes.
For a full overview of all the features, visit the documentation website.
Installation
npm install feedsmithMigrating from v2.x? Check out the migration guide.
Parse Any Feed
The simplest way to parse any feed is to use the universal parseFeed function:
import { parseFeed } from 'feedsmith'
// Works with RSS, Atom, RDF, and JSON Feed
const { format, feed } = parseFeed(feedContent)
console.log('Feed format:', format) // rss, atom, json, rdf
console.log('Feed title:', feed.title)
if (format === 'rss') {
console.log('RSS feed link:', feed.link)
}
Parse Specific Feed Formats
If you know the format in advance, you can use the format-specific parsers:
import {
parseAtomFeed,
parseJsonFeed,
parseRssFeed,
parseRdfFeed
} from 'feedsmith'
// Parse specific formats
const rssFeed = parseRssFeed('rss content')
const atomFeed = parseAtomFeed('atom content')
const rdfFeed = parseRdfFeed('rdf content')
const jsonFeed = parseJsonFeed('json content')
// Access typed data
rssFeed.title
rssFeed.dc?.creator
rssFeed.items?.[0]?.title
Parse OPML Files
import { parseOpml } from 'feedsmith'
const opml = parseOpml('opml content')
opml.head?.title
opml.body?.outlines?.[0].text
opml.body?.outlines?.[1].xmlUrl
Generate a Feed
import { generateRssFeed } from 'feedsmith'
const rss = generateRssFeed({
title: 'My Blog',
link: 'https://example.com',
description: 'A simple blog',
items: [{
title: 'Hello World',
link: 'https://example.com/hello',
description: 'My first post',
pubDate: new Date()
}]
})
console.log(rss) // Complete RSS XML
// You can also generate other formats:
// - generateAtomFeed() for Atom feeds
// - generateJsonFeed() for JSON feeds
// - generateOpml() for OPML files
Error Handling
If the feed is unrecognized or invalid, an Error will be thrown with a descriptive message.
import { parseFeed, parseJsonFeed } from 'feedsmith'
try {
const universalFeed = parseFeed('<not-a-feed></not-a-feed>')
} catch (error) {
// Error: Unrecognized feed format
}
try {
const jsonFeed = parseJsonFeed('{}')
} catch (error) {
// Error: Invalid feed format
}
TypeScript Types
Feedsmith provides comprehensive TypeScript types for all feed formats:
import type { AnyFeed, AtomFeed, JsonFeed, Opml, RssFeed } from 'feedsmith'
// Access all types for a format
type Feed = RssFeed.Feed<string>
type Item = RssFeed.Item<string>
type Category = RssFeed.Category
type Enclosure = RssFeed.Enclosure
// Return type of parseFeed
type Result = AnyFeed
Why Feedsmith?
Why should you use this library over the alternatives?
The key advantage of Feedsmith is that it preserves the original feed structure exactly as defined in each specific feed format.
Many alternative packages attempt to normalize data by:
- Merging distinct fields like
author,dc:creator, andcreatorinto a single property. - Combining date fields such as
dc:dateandpubDatewithout preserving their sources. - Handling multiple
relattributes. - Some libraries try to combine different feed formats into one universal structure.
Acknowledgements
- The library API is inspired by the FeedKit library for Swift.
- XML parsing is provided by fast-xml-parser.
- HTML entity decoding is handled by entities.