Native formatter integrated into TypeScript (tsgo)

[GkIgor]

With the transition to tsgo and the rewrite of TypeScript in Go, this seems like the ideal moment to reconsider tooling consolidation.

Why?

The TypeScript ecosystem currently depends on multiple external tools for formatting and linting:

1. Prettier
2. ESLint
3. Multiple config files
4. Plugins and parser coupling

This creates: fragmentation, tooling duplication, version incompatibilities, extra maintenance overhead

Languages like Go with gofmt and Dart have shown that having an official formatter built into the toolchain greatly simplifies the ecosystem.

Proposal

Introduce a native formatter in tsgo:

• Command example: tsc format
• Integrated with tsconfig.json
• Minimal configuration
• Deterministic output
• Official style maintained by the TypeScript team

The goal is not to replace advanced linting rules, but to: standardize formatting, reduce ecosystem complexity, remove the need for external formatters in most projects, improve performance by leveraging the native Go implementation

Why now?

The rewrite in Go already centralizes parsing, AST handling and type checking. Adding an official formatting pass at this stage would:

• Prevent long term ecosystem fragmentation
• Avoid third party tools depending on unstable internal APIs
• Provide a consistent experience across editors and CI

Even a minimally configurable formatter similar to gofmt would already be a huge win.

[gx089]

tsgo's lsp server already supports formatting - it has the capability textDocument/formatting.
Formatting works ootb, if your editor/lsp-client is able to handle those requests.
It works fine for js/ts/tsx/jsx.
If you need advanced formatting, for example to follow best practice rules defined in eslint-rules, you have to use a 3rd party formatter.
The lsp can't and shouldn't handle all cases of formatting - because it is kinda syntax and token based.