Installing the command-line executable

Assuming you have Rust/Cargo installed, run this command in a terminal:

cargo install prek

It will make the prek command available in your PATH if you've allowed the PATH to be modified when installing Rust. cargo uninstall prek uninstalls.

Back to the crate overview.

Readme

prek

pre-commit is a framework to run hooks written in many languages, and it manages the language toolchain and dependencies for running the hooks.

prek is a reimagined version of pre-commit, built in Rust. It is designed to be a faster, dependency-free and drop-in alternative for it, while also providing some additional long-requested features.

[!NOTE] Although prek is pretty new, it’s already powering real‑world projects like CPython, Apache Airflow, FastAPI, and more projects are picking it up—see Who is using prek?. If you’re looking for an alternative to pre-commit, please give it a try—we’d love your feedback!

Please note that some languages are not yet supported for full drop‑in parity with pre-commit. See Language Support for current status.

Features

A single binary with no dependencies, does not require Python or any other runtime.
Faster than pre-commit and more efficient in disk space usage.
Fully compatible with the original pre-commit configurations and hooks.
Built-in support for monorepos (i.e. workspace mode).
Integration with uv for managing Python virtual environments and dependencies.
Improved toolchain installations for Python, Node.js, Bun, Go, Rust and Ruby, shared between hooks.
Built-in Rust-native implementation of some common hooks.

Installation

Standalone installer

prek provides a standalone installer script to download and install the tool,

On Linux and macOS:

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -LsSf https://github.com/j178/prek/releases/download/v0.3.9/prek-installer.sh | sh

On Windows:

powershell -ExecutionPolicy ByPass -c "irm https://github.com/j178/prek/releases/download/v0.3.9/prek-installer.ps1 | iex"

PyPI

prek is published as Python binary wheel to PyPI, you can install it using pip, uv (recommended), or pipx:

# Using uv (recommended)
uv tool install prek

# Using uvx (install and run in one command)
uvx prek

# Adding prek to the project dev-dependencies
uv add --dev prek

# Using pip
pip install prek

# Using pipx
pipx install prek

Homebrew

brew install prek

mise

To use prek with mise (v2025.8.11 or later):

mise use prek

Cargo binstall

Install pre-compiled binaries from GitHub using cargo-binstall:

cargo binstall prek

Cargo

Build from source using Cargo (Rust 1.89+ is required):

cargo install --locked prek

npmjs

prek is published as a Node.js package and can be installed with any npm-compatible package manager:

# As a dev dependency
npm add -D @j178/prek
pnpm add -D @j178/prek
bun add -D @j178/prek

# Or install globally
npm install -g @j178/prek
pnpm add -g @j178/prek
bun install -g @j178/prek

# Or run directly without installing
npx @j178/prek --version
bunx @j178/prek --version

Nix

prek is available via Nixpkgs.

# Choose what's appropriate for your use case.
# One-off in a shell:
nix-shell -p prek

# NixOS or non-NixOS without flakes:
nix-env -iA nixos.prek

# Non-NixOS with flakes:
nix profile install nixpkgs#prek

Conda

prek is available as prek via conda-forge.

conda install conda-forge::prek

Scoop (Windows)

prek is available via Scoop.

scoop install main/prek

Winget (Windows)

prek is available via winget.

winget install --id j178.Prek

MacPorts

prek is available via MacPorts.

sudo port install prek

GitHub Releases

Pre-built binaries are available for download from the GitHub releases page.

GitHub Actions

prek can be used in GitHub Actions via the j178/prek-action repository.

Example workflow:

name: Prek checks
on: [push, pull_request]

jobs:
  prek:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      - uses: j178/prek-action@v2

This action installs prek and runs prek run --all-files on your repository.

prek is also available via taiki-e/install-action for installing various tools.

If installed via the standalone installer, prek can update itself to the latest version:

prek self update

Quick start

I already use pre-commit: follow the short migration checklist in the quickstart guide to swap in prek safely.
I'm new to pre-commit-style tools: learn the basics—creating a config, running hooks, and installing Git shims—in the beginner quickstart walkthrough.

Why prek?

prek is faster

It is multiple times faster than pre-commit and takes up half the disk space.
It redesigned how hook environments and toolchains are managed, they are all shared between hooks, which reduces the disk space usage and speeds up the installation process.
Repositories are cloned in parallel, and hooks are installed in parallel if their dependencies are disjoint.
Hooks can run in parallel by priority (hooks with the same priority may run concurrently), reducing end-to-end runtime.
It uses uv for creating Python virtualenvs and installing dependencies, which is known for its speed and efficiency.
It implements some common hooks in Rust, built in prek, which are faster than their Python counterparts.
It supports repo: builtin for offline, zero-setup hooks, which is not available in pre-commit.

prek provides a better user experience

No need to install Python or any other runtime, just download a single binary.
No hassle with your Python version or virtual environments, prek automatically installs the required Python version and creates a virtual environment for you.
Built-in support for workspaces (or monorepos), each subproject can have its own .pre-commit-config.yaml file.
prek run has some nifty improvements over pre-commit run, such as:
- prek run --directory <dir> runs hooks for files in the specified directory, no need to use git ls-files -- <dir> | xargs pre-commit run --files anymore.
- prek run --last-commit runs hooks for files changed in the last commit.
- prek run [HOOK] [HOOK] selects and runs multiple hooks.
prek list command lists all available hooks, their ids, and descriptions, providing a better overview of the configured hooks.
prek auto-update supports --cooldown-days to mitigate open source supply chain attacks.
prek provides shell completions for prek run <hook_id> command, making it easier to run specific hooks without remembering their ids.

For more detailed improvements prek offers, take a look at Difference from pre-commit.

Who is using prek?

prek is pretty new, but it is already being used or recommend by some projects and organizations:

Acknowledgements

This project is heavily inspired by the original pre-commit tool, and it wouldn't be possible without the hard work of the maintainers and contributors of that project.

And a special thanks to the Astral team for their remarkable projects, particularly uv, from which I've learned a lot on how to write efficient and idiomatic Rust code.