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Meet the 17 Best Node.js Experts

top nodejs experts - Meet the 17 Best Node.js Experts

Node.js has a vibrant ecosystem shaped by many talented individuals.

Below is an updated ranked list of globally recognized Node.js experts (as of today) chosen for their open-source contributions, leadership in tech startups, influential content creation, roles at major tech companies, and even programming contest accolades. These developers have not only built core tools and frameworks in the Node.js world, but they continue to actively drive the community forward.

  1. Ryan Dahl
  2. Isaac Z. Schlueter
  3. Matteo Collina
  4. Kamil Myśliwiec
  5. Sindre Sorhus
  6. Myles Borins
  7. Jarred Sumner
  8. James Snell
  9. Feross Aboukhadijeh
  10. Tierney Cyren
  11. Eran Hammer
  12. Ionica Bizău
  13. Anna Henningsen
  14. Michael Dawson
  15. Dan Shaw
  16. Mikeal Rogers
  17. Azat Mardan

Now, let’s delve into each expert’s achievements and contributions:

Ryan Dahl

YouTube Video

Deno and OpenTelemetry.

Nationality: American

Ryan is the original creator of Node.js (launched in 2009) and laid the foundation for server-side JavaScript.

He developed Node’s event-driven, non-blocking I/O model that revolutionized how we build scalable servers. After handing off Node.js in 2012, Ryan continued innovating—he later created Deno, a modern runtime for JavaScript/TypeScript. He remains active in open source, applying lessons learned from Node to push the boundaries of secure and efficient runtime design.

Isaac Z. Schlueter

Isaac Z. Schlueter - Meet the 17 Best Node.js Experts

Nationality: American

Isaac is best known as the creator of npm, the Node package manager that transformed how developers share JavaScript code.

In 2010–2011 he wrote npm and later co-founded npm, Inc., serving as CEO/Chief Product Officer and stewarding its growth. Isaac also briefly led the Node.js project after Ryan Dahl, guiding Node’s governance in its early days. Under his leadership, npm became the world’s largest software registry (with millions of users and packages).

Today, Isaac continues to shape the Node ecosystem through open-source work and community engagement, ensuring that package management and Node.js development go hand-in-hand.

Matteo Collina

Nationality: Italian

Matteo is a prolific Node.js core contributor and a member of the Node.js Technical Steering Committee.

He’s the co-creator of Fastify, a high-performance Node web framework boasting billions of monthly downloads. Matteo’s focus on performance and developer experience has made Fastify and related tools (like Pino logger) widely adopted in the Node community. As CTO of Platformatic, he’s driving tooling to simplify backend development. Matteo also speaks internationally about Node.js internals and has a Ph.D., reflecting his blend of deep technical expertise and community leadership.

Few have contributed as much code and knowledge to Node – Matteo’s open-source projects collectively see over 2.6 billion downloads per month, underscoring his impact.

Kamil Myśliwiec

Nationality: Polish

Kamil Myśliwiec is the creator of NestJS, one of the most popular Node.js frameworks in recent years.

A Polish developer, Kamil launched NestJS in 2017 to bring a scalable, enterprise-grade architecture to Node.js. NestJS, inspired by Angular’s modular design, provides a TypeScript-powered, structured way to build servers – and it quickly gained a massive following (now millions of downloads weekly). Kamil continues to lead NestJS development as its maintainer, and co-founded Trilon.io to offer enterprise support around it. Through conference talks and blogs, he advocates for Node.js best practices.

Kamil’s work has made building complex Node applications more accessible, cementing his status as a Node expert.

Sindre Sorhus

I don’t want to create the biggest projects. I want to create the most useful ones.

Nationality: Norwegian

Sindre is a legendary open-source contributor who has arguably touched every Node.js developer’s workflow.

Based in Norway, Sindre maintains over 1100 npm packages, accumulating about 2 billion downloads per month. His projects – from the popular Chalk library (for terminal string styling), to numerous CLI tools and VSCode extensions – are ubiquitous in the JavaScript world. Sindre is a full-time open-sourcer, exemplifying how one developer can impact millions. By curating the Awesome-Node.js list and constantly releasing new utilities, he has set a high standard for Node.js package quality.

Developers worldwide depend on Sindre’s packages daily, making him one of Node’s most influential unsung heroes.

Myles Borins

Myles Borins2 - Meet the 17 Best Node.js Experts

Nationality: Canadian

Myles is a key figure in the Node.js project’s evolution and governance.

They served as the Node.js Foundation’s community lead and later chaired the Node.js Technical Steering Committee. At IBM and Google Cloud, Myles championed Node.js in the enterprise, working to ensure Node ran reliably across platforms. Notably, Myles was instrumental in Node’s release management and the move to a regular LTS schedule. They also oversaw the npm CLI team after npm’s acquisition, focusing on improving the JavaScript supply chain security.

Now at Snowflake, Myles continues to advocate for developers. Their blend of technical contributions (like Node-API for native addons) and community building makes Myles one of Node’s most respected leaders.

Jarred Sumner

Nationality: American

Jarred is the creator of Bun, an ambitious new JavaScript runtime that’s blazing fast and aims to shake up the Node.js ecosystem.

An American developer, Jarred built Bun from scratch in 2021 with a focus on performance – it uses JavaScriptCore and native bindings to outperform Node in many cases. Bun isn’t just a runtime; it bundles, transpiles, and even has a built-in SQLite engine, reflecting Jarred’s full-stack vision. He previously worked at Stripe and started Bun while at Oven (the startup behind Bun). Within a few years, Bun’s potential has excited developers as a modern, all-in-one alternative to Node.

Jarred’s work on Bun showcases his deep understanding of JavaScript engines. He actively engages with the community as Bun rapidly evolves, making him a rising star among Node experts.

James Snell

Nationality: American

James is a long-time Node.js core contributor known for spearheading major features.

As part of the Node.js TSC and a systems engineer at Cloudflare, James has one foot in Node core and another in cutting-edge serverless tech. He authored Node’s HTTP/2 implementation and has contributed to standards like the WHATWG URL spec. James is also driving efforts to standardize APIs across JavaScript runtimes (through the WinterCG group). In Node core, he has been a champion of streams and diagnostics, ensuring Node remains robust for large-scale use. Now working on Cloudflare Workers (a Node-compatible runtime), James bridges the gap between Node and the next generation of JS platforms.

His influence spans code (core contributions) and community (blogging, TC39 proposals).

Feross Aboukhadijeh

Feross Aboukhadijeh - Meet the 17 Best Node.js Experts

Nationality: American

Feross is an open-source innovator who has built tools to expand what’s possible with Node.js.

He created WebTorrent, allowing torrent p2p file sharing directly in the browser (and via Node), and StandardJS, a no-configuration JavaScript linter. Feross has published over 100 npm packages and was recognized as an “open source legend,” with more than 750 packages to his name by some counts. A Stanford alum and former lecturer, he brings academic rigor to his projects. Recently, Feross founded Socket (2019), a security company focused on detecting malware in npm dependencies.

Through Socket and his advocacy, he’s addressing software supply-chain risks. Feross’s blend of hacker ethos (as seen in his fun experiments) and security focus makes him a unique and highly respected Node expert.

Tierney Cyren

Nationality: American

Tierney is a developer advocate who has worked tirelessly to grow and educate the Node.js community.

He was a co-chair of the Node.js Community Committee (CommComm), helping drive community initiatives and diversity programs. Tierney also founded NodeSchool NYC workshops and contributed to Electron’s governance. Formerly at NodeSource and Microsoft, and now a Principal Dev Advocate at Twilio, Tierney creates content to help developers of all levels succeed with Node.js. He has served as the Node.js Foundation’s Individual Membership Director. Tierney’s friendly presence and mentorship have onboarded countless new Node contributors.

For his community leadership and advocacy of Node.js (and JavaScript in general), he’s widely respected as an expert and mentor.

Eran Hammer

Nationality: Israeli

Eran Hammer is the creator of hapi (Hapi.js), one of the first enterprise-grade Node.js frameworks.

At Walmart Labs around 2012, Eran led the team that built hapi to handle Black Friday scale traffic. Hapi’s emphasis on configuration, security, and stability reflected Eran’s background as one of the original authors of OAuth – he co-wrote the OAuth 1.0 and 2.0 specs. Beyond hapi, Eran founded Sideway Inc. and continued to maintain an ecosystem of hapi plugins and the Joi validation library. He is known for his strong stance on open-source sustainability and was vocal in Node’s early community. While he has stepped back from active Node coding in recent years, Eran’s frameworks and security best practices remain foundational in Node.js backends. His influence earns him a spot among the top Node experts.

Ionica Bizau

Nationality: Romanian

Ionică (John Bizau) is a developer famous for the sheer volume of Node.js open-source projects he’s created.

After discovering Node.js, Ionica authored dozens upon dozens of JavaScript libraries and CLI tools, accumulating an impressive number of GitHub stars across his repositories. Many of his small utilities (like weather info, GitHub integrations, etc.) went viral in the dev community. He’s also the founder of Bloggify, a Node.js-based blogging platform, and shares lessons on his tech blog. On Stack Overflow, Ionica is a top contributor in the JavaScript category.

By his early 30s he had one of the most prolific GitHub portfolios in Eastern Europe. His passion for learning by building has inspired many developers to start contributing to Node.js projects.

Anna Henningsen

Anna Henningsen - Meet the 17 Best Node.js Experts

Nationality: German

Anna has been one of the most active Node.js core contributors in recent years.

Based in Germany, Anna worked on the Node.js Core team (including at NearForm) and contributed significantly to areas like async hooks, workers, and diagnostics. She was known for diving into Node’s C++ internals and fixing bugs deep in libuv and V8 integration. Anna also served on the Node.js Technical Steering Committee. Her peers credit her with extraordinary productivity – for about four years she was among the top contributors to Node core, fueled by a genuine passion for the project. Anna often live-coded Node features on stage (e.g. building an EventEmitter from scratch at NodeConf EU).

While she has since moved to other tech endeavors, Anna’s contributions (hundreds of commits to Node core) and mentorship of new contributors have left a lasting legacy.

Michael Dawson

Nationality: Canadian

Michael Dawson is an influential Node.js contributor and leader who chaired the Node.js Technical Steering Committee.

Formerly Node.js lead at IBM (now at Red Hat), Michael has contributed to a broad range of core areas – from platform support to driving Node-API, the stable native module interface. He has been an advocate for Node.js in enterprise environments and often authors technical blog posts on Node’s direction. Michael also helped organize Code+Learn workshops to onboard new contributors. As TSC chair, he guided high-level project decisions and strategic initiatives.

His steady leadership and coding contributions earned him the reputation as a go-to Node expert. Michael continues to be active in the OpenJS Foundation and Node’s release working group, ensuring Node.js remains stable and forward-looking for all users.

Dan Shaw

Nationality: American

Dan “dshaw” Shaw is often called the “Godfather of Node.js” for his early and ongoing contributions to the Node community.

He co-founded NodeSource (the enterprise Node support company) and was a founding member of the Node.js Foundation Board. Dan has been involved in numerous Node startups (Voxer, Storify, etc.). He also hosted the popular NodeUp podcast for years, amplifying community voices. Dan played a key role in bringing business stakeholders together to form the Node.js Foundation in 2015, which healed the io.js fork. A frequent conference speaker and panelist, he’s dedicated to making Node.js successful in production. After NodeSource, Dan took on roles (e.g., at PayPal) that continue to advocate Node.

His focus on community growth and ecosystem health – not just coding – makes him one of Node’s best-known ambassadors.

Mikeal Rogers

Mikeal Rogers - Meet the 17 Best Node.js Experts

Nationality: American

Mikeal has been a driving force behind Node.js from the community and governance side.

He created the request library, which for years was Node’s most popular HTTP client module (now surpassed by native fetch). Mikeal was also instrumental in the 2015 Node/io.js reconciliation – he was the facilitator who helped form the Node.js Foundation, later serving as its Community Manager. In Node’s early days, Mikeal organized the first NodeConf conferences, helping grow the community. He has a long history in open source (ex-Mozilla) and brought that experience to Node. Mikeal also co-founded the JS Party podcast and has been active in the Node.js Collab Summits.

After Node.js Foundation, he joined Protocol Labs to work on decentralized tech (IPFS). Mikeal’s breadth of contributions – from writing code (request, etc.) to community-building – solidify his standing as a Node.js expert and advocate.

Azat Mardan

Nationality: American

Azat is a prolific author and educator in the Node.js world. He has written over 15 programming books, including “Practical Node.js” and “Pro Express.js”, which have become go-to resources for Node developers.

Azat’s talent for teaching also led him to create “Node University,” offering video courses on Node and JS. With an MS in computer science, he taught as an adjunct professor and served as a technology lead at top companies (he was a Node engineer at Capital One and later a Microsoft MVP). Through countless workshops, conference talks, and blog tutorials on webapplog.com, Azat has helped a generation of developers learn Node.js best practices.

His books cover full-stack Node development, and their enduring popularity is a testament to Azat’s expertise and clear communication. He continues to be an active voice in the Node community through writing and speaking.

Wrap Up

These legends represent exceptional talent, making them extremely challenging to headhunt. However, there are thousands of other highly skilled IT professionals available to hire with our help. Contact us, and we will be happy to discuss your hiring needs.

Note: We’ve dedicated significant time and effort to creating and verifying this curated list of top talent. If you intend to share or make use of it in any way, we kindly ask that you include a backlink to the original source – EchoGlobal.

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