How to fix SyntaxError: await is only valid in async functions

How to fix SyntaxError: await is only valid in async functions and the top level bodies of modules

Technologies

node.js

Variants

SyntaxError: await is only valid in async functions, async generators and modules (Firefox)

Description

async / await were great introductions to the Javascript language, replacing Promises and callbacks before that. The syntax is certainly more intuitive and generally easier to understand. Once you've learned async / await, you'll want to start using it everywhere! However, there is one limitation (even in Node 18) - it cannot be used at the top level of Node. Let's look at an example:

Example

const foo = async () => {
  console.log('foo');
};

await foo(); // SyntaxError: await is only valid in async functions and the top level bodies of modules

Solution

There's a little trick you can use to fix this problem - wrap all of the code in a self-executing anonymous function:

(() => {
  const foo = async () => {
    console.log('foo');
  };

  await foo();
})();

And that's it! No more issue running async functions.