hono

name	hono
description	Use when building Hono web applications or when the user asks about Hono APIs, routing, middleware, JSX, validation, testing, or streaming. TRIGGER when code imports from 'hono' or 'hono/*', or user mentions Hono. Use `pnpm exec hono request` (or `pnpm dlx hono request`) to test endpoints.

Hono Skill

Build Hono web applications. This skill provides inline API knowledge for AI. CLI examples use pnpm; Hono itself is package-manager agnostic. If the hono-docs MCP server is configured, prefer its tools for the latest documentation over the inline reference.

pnpm vs npx

• pnpm exec hono … — runs the hono binary from this project’s node_modules (use when hono is installed, e.g. devDependencies).
• pnpm dlx hono … — downloads and runs the CLI once, similar to npx hono …, when you do not have a local install.

npm/yarn users: substitute npx hono … or yarn dlx hono … for pnpm dlx hono …, or run the local binary with npm exec hono … / yarn hono … where your toolchain exposes it.

Hono CLI Usage

Request Testing

Test endpoints without starting an HTTP server. Uses app.request() internally.

# GET request (local install)
pnpm exec hono request [file] -P /path

# POST request with JSON body
pnpm exec hono request [file] -X POST -P /api/users -d '{"name": "test"}'

Without hono in the project, use pnpm dlx instead of pnpm exec for the same flags.

Note: Do not pass credentials directly in CLI arguments. Use environment variables for sensitive values. hono request does not support Cloudflare Workers bindings (KV, D1, R2, etc.). When bindings are required, use workers-fetch instead:

pnpm exec workers-fetch /path
pnpm exec workers-fetch -X POST -H "Content-Type:application/json" -d '{"name":"test"}' /api/users

Use pnpm dlx workers-fetch if the package is not installed locally.

---

Hono API Reference

App Constructor

import { Hono } from "hono";

const app = new Hono();

// With TypeScript generics
type Env = {
  Bindings: { DATABASE: D1Database; KV: KVNamespace };
  Variables: { user: User };
};
const app = new Hono<Env>();

Routing Methods

app.get("/path", handler);
app.post("/path", handler);
app.put("/path", handler);
app.delete("/path", handler);
app.patch("/path", handler);
app.options("/path", handler);
app.all("/path", handler); // all HTTP methods
app.on("PURGE", "/path", handler); // custom method
app.on(["PUT", "DELETE"], "/path", handler); // multiple methods

Routing Patterns

// Path parameters
app.get("/user/:name", (c) => {
  const name = c.req.param("name");
  return c.json({ name });
});

// Multiple params
app.get("/posts/:id/comments/:commentId", (c) => {
  const { id, commentId } = c.req.param();
});

// Optional parameters
app.get("/api/animal/:type?", (c) => c.text("Animal!"));

// Wildcards
app.get("/wild/*/card", (c) => c.text("Wildcard"));

// Regexp constraints
app.get("/post/:date{[0-9]+}/:title{[a-z]+}", (c) => {
  const { date, title } = c.req.param();
});

// Chained routes
app
  .get("/endpoint", (c) => c.text("GET"))
  .post((c) => c.text("POST"))
  .delete((c) => c.text("DELETE"));

Route Grouping

// Using route()
const api = new Hono();
api.get("/users", (c) => c.json([]));

const app = new Hono();
app.route("/api", api); // mounts at /api/users

// Using basePath()
const app = new Hono().basePath("/api");
app.get("/users", (c) => c.json([])); // GET /api/users

Error Handling

app.notFound((c) => c.json({ message: "Not Found" }, 404));

app.onError((err, c) => {
  console.error(err);
  return c.json({ message: "Internal Server Error" }, 500);
});

---

Context (c)

Response Methods

c.text("Hello"); // text/plain
c.json({ message: "Hello" }); // application/json
c.html("<h1>Hello</h1>"); // text/html
c.redirect("/new-path"); // 302 redirect
c.redirect("/new-path", 301); // 301 redirect
c.body("raw body", 200, headers); // raw response
c.notFound(); // 404 response

Headers & Status

c.status(201);
c.header("X-Custom", "value");
c.header("Cache-Control", "no-store");

Variables (request-scoped data)

// In middleware
c.set("user", { id: 1, name: "Alice" });

// In handler
const user = c.get("user");
// or
const user = c.var.user;

Environment (Cloudflare Workers)

const value = await c.env.KV.get("key");
const db = c.env.DATABASE;
c.executionCtx.waitUntil(promise);

Renderer

app.use(async (c, next) => {
  c.setRenderer((content) =>
    c.html(
      <html><body>{content}</body></html>
    )
  )
  await next()
})

app.get('/', (c) => c.render(<h1>Hello</h1>))

---

HonoRequest (c.req)

c.req.param("id"); // path parameter
c.req.param(); // all path params as object
c.req.query("page"); // query string parameter
c.req.query(); // all query params as object
c.req.queries("tags"); // multiple values: ?tags=A&tags=B → ['A', 'B']
c.req.header("Authorization"); // request header
c.req.header(); // all headers (keys are lowercase)

// Body parsing
await c.req.json(); // parse JSON body
await c.req.text(); // parse text body
await c.req.formData(); // parse as FormData
await c.req.parseBody(); // parse multipart/form-data or urlencoded
await c.req.arrayBuffer(); // parse as ArrayBuffer
await c.req.blob(); // parse as Blob

// Validated data (used with validator middleware)
c.req.valid("json");
c.req.valid("query");
c.req.valid("form");
c.req.valid("param");

// Properties
c.req.url; // full URL string
c.req.path; // pathname
c.req.method; // HTTP method
c.req.raw; // underlying Request object

---

Middleware

Using Built-in Middleware

import { cors } from "hono/cors";
import { logger } from "hono/logger";
import { basicAuth } from "hono/basic-auth";
import { prettyJSON } from "hono/pretty-json";
import { secureHeaders } from "hono/secure-headers";
import { etag } from "hono/etag";
import { compress } from "hono/compress";
import { poweredBy } from "hono/powered-by";
import { timing } from "hono/timing";
import { cache } from "hono/cache";
import { bearerAuth } from "hono/bearer-auth";
import { jwt } from "hono/jwt";
import { csrf } from "hono/csrf";
import { ipRestriction } from "hono/ip-restriction";
import { bodyLimit } from "hono/body-limit";
import { requestId } from "hono/request-id";
import { methodOverride } from "hono/method-override";
import { trailingSlash, trimTrailingSlash } from "hono/trailing-slash";

// Registration
app.use(logger()); // all routes
app.use("/api/*", cors()); // specific path
app.post("/api/*", basicAuth({ username: "admin", password: "secret" }));

Custom Middleware

// Inline
app.use(async (c, next) => {
  const start = Date.now();
  await next();
  const elapsed = Date.now() - start;
  c.res.headers.set("X-Response-Time", `${elapsed}ms`);
});

// Reusable with createMiddleware
import { createMiddleware } from "hono/factory";

const auth = createMiddleware(async (c, next) => {
  const token = c.req.header("Authorization");
  if (!token) return c.json({ error: "Unauthorized" }, 401);
  await next();
});

app.use("/api/*", auth);

Middleware Execution Order

Middleware executes in registration order. await next() calls the next middleware/handler, and code after next() runs on the way back:

Request → mw1 before → mw2 before → handler → mw2 after → mw1 after → Response

app.use(async (c, next) => {
  // before handler
  await next();
  // after handler
});

---

Validation

Validation targets: json, form, query, header, param, cookie.

Zod Validator

import { zValidator } from "@hono/zod-validator";
import { z } from "zod";

const schema = z.object({
  title: z.string().min(1),
  body: z.string(),
});

app.post("/posts", zValidator("json", schema), (c) => {
  const data = c.req.valid("json"); // fully typed
  return c.json(data, 201);
});

Valibot / Standard Schema Validator

import { sValidator } from "@hono/standard-validator";
import * as v from "valibot";

const schema = v.object({ name: v.string(), age: v.number() });

app.post("/users", sValidator("json", schema), (c) => {
  const data = c.req.valid("json");
  return c.json(data, 201);
});

---

JSX

Setup

In tsconfig.json:

{
  "compilerOptions": {
    "jsx": "react-jsx",
    "jsxImportSource": "hono/jsx"
  }
}

Or use pragma: /** @jsxImportSource hono/jsx */

Important: Files using JSX must have a .tsx extension. Rename .ts to .tsx or the compiler will fail.

Components

import type { PropsWithChildren } from "hono/jsx";

const Layout = (props: PropsWithChildren) => (
  <html>
    <head>
      <title>My App</title>
    </head>
    <body>{props.children}</body>
  </html>
);

const UserCard = ({ name }: { name: string }) => (
  <div class="card">
    <h2>{name}</h2>
  </div>
);

app.get("/", (c) => {
  return c.html(
    <Layout>
      <UserCard name="Alice" />
    </Layout>,
  );
});

jsxRenderer Middleware

Use jsxRenderer middleware for layouts. See pnpm exec hono docs /docs/middleware/builtin/jsx-renderer (or pnpm dlx hono docs … without a local install) for details.

Async Components

const UserList = async () => {
  const users = await fetchUsers();
  return (
    <ul>
      {users.map((u) => (
        <li>{u.name}</li>
      ))}
    </ul>
  );
};

Fragments

const Items = () => (
  <>
    <li>Item 1</li>
    <li>Item 2</li>
  </>
);

---

Streaming

import { stream, streamText, streamSSE } from "hono/streaming";

// Basic stream
app.get("/stream", (c) => {
  return stream(c, async (stream) => {
    stream.onAbort(() => console.log("Aborted"));
    await stream.write(new Uint8Array([0x48, 0x65]));
    await stream.pipe(readableStream);
  });
});

// Text stream
app.get("/stream-text", (c) => {
  return streamText(c, async (stream) => {
    await stream.writeln("Hello");
    await stream.sleep(1000);
    await stream.write("World");
  });
});

// Server-Sent Events
app.get("/sse", (c) => {
  return streamSSE(c, async (stream) => {
    let id = 0;
    while (true) {
      await stream.writeSSE({
        data: JSON.stringify({ time: new Date().toISOString() }),
        event: "time-update",
        id: String(id++),
      });
      await stream.sleep(1000);
    }
  });
});

---

Testing with app.request()

Test endpoints without starting an HTTP server:

// GET
const res = await app.request("/posts");
expect(res.status).toBe(200);
expect(await res.json()).toEqual({ posts: [] });

// POST with JSON
const res = await app.request("/posts", {
  method: "POST",
  body: JSON.stringify({ title: "Hello" }),
  headers: { "Content-Type": "application/json" },
});

// POST with FormData
const formData = new FormData();
formData.append("name", "Alice");
const res = await app.request("/users", { method: "POST", body: formData });

// With mock env (Cloudflare Workers bindings)
const res = await app.request(
  "/api/data",
  {},
  { KV: mockKV, DATABASE: mockDB },
);

// Using Request object
const req = new Request("http://localhost/api", { method: "DELETE" });
const res = await app.request(req);

---

Hono Client (RPC)

Type-safe API client using shared types between server and client.

IMPORTANT: Routes MUST be chained for type inference to work. Without chaining, the client cannot infer route types.

// Server: routes MUST be chained to preserve types
const route = app
  .post("/posts", zValidator("json", schema), (c) => {
    return c.json({ ok: true }, 201);
  })
  .get("/posts", (c) => {
    return c.json({ posts: [] });
  });
export type AppType = typeof route;

// Client: use hc() with the exported type
import { hc } from "hono/client";
import type { AppType } from "./server";

const client = hc<AppType>("http://localhost:8787/");
const res = await client.posts.$post({ json: { title: "Hello" } });
const data = await res.json(); // fully typed

Type utilities:

import type { InferRequestType, InferResponseType } from "hono/client";

type ReqType = InferRequestType<typeof client.posts.$post>;
type ResType = InferResponseType<typeof client.posts.$post, 200>;

---

Helpers

Helpers are utility functions imported from hono/<helper-name>:

import { getConnInfo } from "hono/conninfo";
import { getCookie, setCookie, deleteCookie } from "hono/cookie";
import { css, Style } from "hono/css";
import { createFactory } from "hono/factory";
import { html, raw } from "hono/html";
import { stream, streamText, streamSSE } from "hono/streaming";
import { testClient } from "hono/testing";
import { upgradeWebSocket } from "hono/cloudflare-workers"; // or other adapter

Available helpers: Accepts, Adapter, ConnInfo, Cookie, css, Dev, Factory, html, JWT, Proxy, Route, SSG, Streaming, Testing, WebSocket.

For details, use pnpm exec hono docs /docs/helpers/<helper-name> (or pnpm dlx hono docs …).

Factory

Use createFactory to define Env once and share it across app, middleware, and handlers:

import { createFactory } from "hono/factory";

const factory = createFactory<Env>();

// Create app (Env type is inherited)
const app = factory.createApp();

// Create middleware (Env type is inherited, no need to pass generics)
const mw = factory.createMiddleware(async (c, next) => {
  await next();
});

// Create handlers separately (preserves type inference)
const handlers = factory.createHandlers(logger(), (c) =>
  c.json({ message: "Hello" }),
);
app.get("/api", ...handlers);

---

Best Practices

• Write handlers inline in route definitions for proper type inference of path params.
• Use app.route() to organize large apps by feature, not Rails-style controllers.
• Use createFactory() to share Env type across app, middleware, and handlers.
• Use c.set()/c.get() to pass data between middleware and handlers.
• Chain validators for multiple request parts (param + query + json).
• Export app type for RPC: export type AppType = typeof routes
• Use app.request() for testing — no server startup needed.

Adapters

Hono runs on multiple runtimes. The default export works for Cloudflare Workers, Deno, and Bun. For Node.js, use the Node adapter:

// Cloudflare Workers / Deno / Bun
export default app;

// Node.js
import { serve } from "@hono/node-server";
serve(app);