Neon is a Rust bindings library for writing safe and fast native Node.js modules.
Node.js native addons traditionally require writing C++ code that directly interfaces with the Node.js C API, which is error-prone and difficult to maintain. Neon solves this by providing Rust bindings to the Node-API standard, allowing developers to write native modules in Rust while leveraging Rust's memory safety guarantees. The tool handles the low-level interoperability between Rust and JavaScript, eliminating entire classes of bugs related to memory management and type safety that plague C++ implementations.
Neon suits projects where performance-critical operations need to run at native speed but where the safety and maintainability benefits of Rust outweigh the overhead of C++. It works across Linux, macOS, and Windows, and supports all current and maintenance releases of Node.js, with experimental support for Bun. The tool requires Rust stable version 1.65 or higher.
The project maintains an active test suite covering both JavaScript and Rust components through NPM and Cargo workspaces. Development activity shows ongoing attention to platform compatibility and Node.js version support, with explicit tracking of which Node releases receive active support. The project provides comprehensive documentation including fundamentals guides, API references, and migration resources for major version transitions.
