Semantic Release: automated semantic versioning

What is Semantic Release?

Semantic Release automates the entire publishing process: analyzes commits, determines the next semantic version, generates changelog, creates Git tags, and publishes the package. All based on Conventional Commits.

Installation

npm install --save-dev semantic-release

Basic configuration

{
  "branches": ["main"],
  "plugins": [
    "@semantic-release/commit-analyzer",
    "@semantic-release/release-notes-generator",
    "@semantic-release/npm",
    "@semantic-release/github"
  ]
}

How it determines version

• fix commits → patch version (1.0.0 → 1.0.1)
• feat commits → minor version (1.0.0 → 1.1.0)
• BREAKING CHANGE → major version (1.0.0 → 2.0.0)

CI flow

jobs:
  release:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - run: npm ci
      - run: npx semantic-release
        env:
          GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
          NPM_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.NPM_TOKEN }}

Benefits

• Eliminates human decisions about versioning.
• Accurate automatic changelogs.
• Consistent, error-free publishing.

Want to automate your releases? At Vynta we configure Semantic Release for your project.