> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://mintlify.com/tree-sitter/tree-sitter/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# parse

> Parse source files using a Tree-sitter parser

The `parse` command parses source files using a Tree-sitter parser. You can pass any number of file paths and glob patterns, or read from stdin if no paths are provided.

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse [OPTIONS] [PATHS]...
```

**Aliases:** `p`

The command will exit with a non-zero status code if any parse errors occurred.

## Input Sources

### File Paths

Pass file paths or glob patterns directly:

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse file1.js file2.js
tree-sitter parse src/**/*.js
```

### Paths File

Use `--paths` to provide a file containing paths:

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse --paths file-list.txt
```

### Standard Input

If no paths are provided, input is read from stdin:

```bash theme={null}
echo "console.log('hello')" | tree-sitter parse
```

## Output Formats

### Default (S-Expression)

By default, outputs the parse tree as an S-expression:

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse example.js
```

### CST Format

Pretty-printed concrete syntax tree:

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse --cst example.js
```

### XML Format

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse --xml example.js
```

### Graphviz Dot

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse --dot example.js | dot -Tpng > tree.png
```

### JSON Summary

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse --json-summary example.js
```

## Options

### Input Options

<ParamField path="--paths" type="file">
  The path to a file that contains paths to source files to parse.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-p, --grammar-path" type="path">
  The path to the directory containing the grammar. Implies `--rebuild`.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-l, --lib-path" type="path">
  The path to the parser's dynamic library. Used instead of the cached or automatically generated library.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="--lang-name" type="string">
  If `--lib-path` is used, the name of the language used to extract the library's language function.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="--scope" type="scope">
  The language scope to use for parsing. Useful when the language is ambiguous.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="--encoding" type="encoding">
  Set the encoding of the input file. One of `utf8`, `utf16-le`, `utf16-be`.

  By default, the CLI looks for a [BOM](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byte_order_mark) to determine if the file is UTF-16BE or UTF-16LE. If no BOM is present, UTF-8 is assumed.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-n, --test-number" type="number">
  Parse a specific test in the corpus. The test number matches the output of `tree-sitter test`.
</ParamField>

### Output Options

<ParamField path="--dot" type="flag">
  Output the parse tree with [graphviz dot](https://graphviz.org/doc/info/lang.html).
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-x, --xml" type="flag">
  Output the parse tree in XML format.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-c, --cst" type="flag">
  Output the parse tree in a pretty-printed CST format.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-j, --json-summary" type="flag">
  Output parsing results in a JSON format.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-q, --quiet" type="flag">
  Suppress main output.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="--no-ranges" type="flag">
  Omit the node's ranges from the default parse output. Useful when copying S-Expressions to a test file.
</ParamField>

### Debug Options

<ParamField path="-d, --debug" type="flag | type">
  Output parsing and lexing logs to stderr. Can optionally specify a debug type.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-D, --debug-graph" type="flag">
  Output logs of the graphs of the stack and parse trees during parsing. Graphs are constructed with [graphviz dot](https://graphviz.org/doc/info/lang.html), and output is written to `log.html`.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="--open-log" type="flag">
  When using `--debug-graph`, open the log file in the default browser.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-0, --debug-build" type="flag">
  Compile the parser with debug flags enabled. Useful when debugging with `gdb` or `lldb`.
</ParamField>

### Performance Options

<ParamField path="-s, --stat" type="flag">
  Show parsing statistics.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-t, --time" type="flag">
  Print the time taken to parse the file. If edits are provided, also prints time after each edit.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="--timeout" type="microseconds">
  Set the timeout for parsing a single file, in microseconds.
</ParamField>

### Edit Options

<ParamField path="--edits" type="edit">
  Apply edits after parsing the file. Edits are in the format: `row,col|position delcount insert_text` where row, col, and position are 0-indexed.

  Can be supplied multiple times.
</ParamField>

### Build Options

<ParamField path="--wasm" type="flag">
  Compile and run the parser as a Wasm module (only if the CLI was built with `--features=wasm`).
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="-r, --rebuild" type="flag">
  Force a rebuild of the parser before parsing.
</ParamField>

<ParamField path="--config-path" type="path">
  The path to an alternative configuration (`config.json`) file. See [init-config](/cli/init-config).
</ParamField>

## Examples

### Parse a Single File

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse example.js
```

### Parse Multiple Files with Statistics

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse --stat src/*.js
```

### Parse with Debug Output

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse --debug-graph --open-log example.js
```

### Parse and Measure Performance

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse --time --stat example.js
```

### Parse with Edits

```bash theme={null}
tree-sitter parse --edits "0,5|5 3 foo" example.js
```

### Parse from Stdin

```bash theme={null}
echo "const x = 42;" | tree-sitter parse --scope source.js
```