Turbopack: Add a check for node version before allowing workerThreads (#91614)

We want to start dogfooding `workerThreads`, but we can only safely do it if you have a new enough node version.

We don't have any sort of strong enforcement around node.js version in front (e.g. you could have a misconfigured nvm or fnm), so we need to check the node version first.

- napi-rs/napi-rs#2555 (comment)
- nodejs/node#55877
- nodejs/node#61400
- nodejs/node#61661

Looks like this:

![Screenshot 2026-03-18 at 1.04.10 PM.png](https://app.graphite.com/user-attachments/assets/bfdb1051-2ebc-403a-af5c-7c715d651aa9.png)

Related Node.js version bump for front: vercel/front#65059

Author: bgw

packages/next/src/server/config-schema.ts

@@ -351,7 +351,7 @@ export const experimentalSchema = {
   webpackMemoryOptimizations: z.boolean().optional(),
   turbopackMemoryLimit: z.number().optional(),
   turbopackPluginRuntimeStrategy: z
-    .enum(['workerThreads', 'childProcesses'])
+    .enum(['workerThreads', 'childProcesses', 'forceWorkerThreads'])
     .optional(),
   turbopackMinify: z.boolean().optional(),
   turbopackFileSystemCacheForDev: z.boolean().optional(),

packages/next/src/server/config-shared.ts

@@ -628,9 +628,32 @@ export interface ExperimentalConfig {
   turbopackMemoryLimit?: number
 
   /**
-   * Selects the runtime backend used by Turbopack for Node.js evaluation.
-   */
-  turbopackPluginRuntimeStrategy?: 'workerThreads' | 'childProcesses'
+   * Selects the backend used by Turbopack for Node.js evaluation, e.g. webpack
+   * loaders, Babel, or PostCSS.
+   *
+   * This defaults to `'childProcesses'`, which creates a pool of child node.js
+   * processes and communciates with them over sockets.
+   *
+   * `'workerThreads'` should use less memory and CPU. It may become the default
+   * in a future version of Next.js.
+   *
+   * Node.js 24.13.1+ or 25.4.0+ is required for `'workerThreads'` due to memory
+   * safety bugs in older versions. If you use this option with an older Node.js
+   * version, the setting is ignored and a warning is emitted. Bun and Deno are
+   * assumed safe, and are not checked for compatibility.
+   *
+   * - Fix for memory safety issue: <https://github.com/nodejs/node/pull/55877>
+   * - Backported to 25.4.0: <https://github.com/nodejs/node/pull/61400>
+   * - Backported to 24.13.1: <https://github.com/nodejs/node/pull/61661>
+   *
+   * `'forceWorkerThreads'` behaves like `'workerThreads'` but skips the
+   * version-gated downgrade. You should not use this option unless you're
+   * confident that the version check in Next.js is wrong.
+   */
+  turbopackPluginRuntimeStrategy?:
+    | 'workerThreads'
+    | 'childProcesses'
+    | 'forceWorkerThreads'
 
   /**
    * Enable minification. Defaults to true in build mode and false in dev mode.

packages/next/src/server/config.ts

@@ -2,6 +2,7 @@ import { existsSync } from 'fs'
 import { basename, extname, join, relative, isAbsolute, resolve } from 'path'
 import { pathToFileURL } from 'url'
 import findUp from 'next/dist/compiled/find-up'
+import semver from 'next/dist/compiled/semver'
 import * as Log from '../build/output/log'
 import * as ciEnvironment from '../server/ci-info'
 import {
@@ -1453,6 +1454,52 @@ function assignDefaultsAndValidate(
     result.experimental.useCache = result.cacheComponents
   }
 
+  // Node.js version gate for turbopackPluginRuntimeStrategy: 'workerThreads'.
+  // Older Node.js versions have memory safety bugs in worker threads. Bun and
+  // Deno are not affected by this check.
+  {
+    const strategy = result.experimental.turbopackPluginRuntimeStrategy
+    const isForced = strategy === 'forceWorkerThreads'
+    if (strategy === 'workerThreads' || isForced) {
+      // Normalize 'forceWorkerThreads' → 'workerThreads' for Rust/serde
+      result.experimental.turbopackPluginRuntimeStrategy = 'workerThreads'
+
+      const isBun = !!process.versions.bun
+      const isDeno = !!process.versions.deno
+      if (!isBun && !isDeno) {
+        const nodeVersion = process.versions.node
+        const WORKER_THREADS_SAFE_RANGE = '>=24.13.1 <25.0.0 || >=25.4.0'
+        if (
+          !semver.satisfies(nodeVersion, WORKER_THREADS_SAFE_RANGE, {
+            includePrerelease: true,
+          })
+        ) {
+          if (isForced) {
+            Log.warn(
+              `\`experimental.turbopackPluginRuntimeStrategy = ` +
+                `'forceWorkerThreads'\` has been enabled, but you're using ` +
+                `Node.js ${nodeVersion}, which has known memory safety bugs ` +
+                `with worker threads used from the Node-API. You may ` +
+                `experience crashes, segmentation faults, or other ` +
+                `instability. Upgrade to Node.js ${WORKER_THREADS_SAFE_RANGE}.`
+            )
+          } else {
+            Log.warn(
+              `\`experimental.turbopackPluginRuntimeStrategy = ` +
+                `'workerThreads'\` is set but has been ` +
+                `ignored because you're using Node.js ${nodeVersion}, which ` +
+                `has memory safety bugs in worker threads. Falling back to ` +
+                `'childProcesses'. Upgrade to Node.js ` +
+                `${WORKER_THREADS_SAFE_RANGE}.`
+            )
+            result.experimental.turbopackPluginRuntimeStrategy =
+              'childProcesses'
+          }
+        }
+      }
+    }
+  }
+
   // Store the distDirRoot in the config before it is modified for development mode
   ;(result as NextConfigComplete).distDirRoot = result.distDir
   // Pre-compute the effective hash salt (used by both Webpack and Turbopack).

test/production/turbopack-node-backend/next.config.js

@@ -1,5 +1,4 @@
-const runtimeStrategy =
-  process.env.TEST_TURBOPACK_PLUGIN_RUNTIME_STRATEGY || 'workerThreads'
+const runtimeStrategy = process.env.TEST_TURBOPACK_PLUGIN_RUNTIME_STRATEGY
 
 module.exports = {
   experimental: {

test/production/turbopack-node-backend/turbopack-node-backend.test.ts

@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 import { nextTestSetup } from 'e2e-utils'
 
 describe.each([
-  ['workerThreads', true],
+  ['forceWorkerThreads', true],
   ['childProcesses', false],
 ] as const)(
   'turbopack-node-backend (%s)',