Sometimes, we want to read file as a base64 string with Node.js

In this article, we’ll look at how to read file as a base64 string with Node.js.

How to read file as a base64 string with Node.js?

To read file as a base64 string with Node.js, we can use the readFile method with the encoding option.

For instance, we write

const fs = require('fs').promises;

const read = async () => {
  const contents = await fs.readFile('/path/to/file.jpg', {
    encoding: 'base64'
  });
}

to call fs.readFile with the file path and an object with the encoding property set to 'base64' to read the file as a base64 string.

It returns a promise, so we use await to get the read file contents from the resolved value.

We require the promise version of the fs module with

const fs = require('fs').promises;

Conclusion

To read file as a base64 string with Node.js, we can use the readFile method with the encoding option.