lambdaisland/native-image

[](https://cljdoc.org/d/com.lambdaisland/native-image) [](https://clojars.org/com.lambdaisland/native-image) 

Modernised fork of taylorwood/clj.native-image, with many thanks to the original author.

Build GraalVM native images using Clojure Deps and CLI tools.

Useful for creating lightweight, native CLI executables using Clojure and deps.edn.

It's operation is fairly simple, it invokes Clojure's compiler to turn namespaces into Java class files, it then invokes the GraalVM native-image tool to create a single binary.

Prerequisites

• Clojure CLI tools
• GraalVM

Recent enough GraalVM distributions have native-image directly under bin/. If either PATH or JAVA_HOME is set correctly then it'll be found automatically.

Tested with GraalVM CE 21 and 25.

Installation

To use the latest release, add the following to your deps.edn (Clojure CLI)

com.lambdaisland/native-image {:mvn/version "0.3.58"}

or add the following to your project.clj (Leiningen)

[com.lambdaisland/native-image "0.3.58"]

Usage

The main namespace is lambdaisland.native-image, which has a single subcommand, build

$ clojure -M -m lambdaisland.native-image build --help
NAME
  clojure -M -m lambdaisland.native-image build  ——  Build a native image, with `main-ns` as entry point.

SYNOPSIS
  clojure -M -m lambdaisland.native-image build <main-ns> [-n | --native-image-path <path>] [-e | --echo]
    [-p | --precompile <namespace>] [--compile-path <path>] [<args>...]

FLAGS
  -n, --native-image-path <path>   Use a specific native-image binary. (default "/home/arne/opt/graalvm-community-25.3.4.1+1.1/bin/native-image")
  -e, --echo                       Print out native-image invocation
  -p, --precompile <namespace>     Namespace to compile before the main ns, e.g. because they contain gen-class directives
      --compile-path <path>        Clojure's compilation output path (default "target")

Pass it a namespace to use as its main entrypoint. It should have (:gen-class) and a main function. Additional flags after -- are passed on directly to native-image.

For example, to build itself:

clojure -M -m lambdaisland.native-image build lambdaisland.native-image -- --initialize-at-build-time -march=native

Lambda Island Open Source

Thank you! native-image is made possible thanks to our generous backers. Become a backer on OpenCollective so that we can continue to make native-image better.

 

native-image is part of a growing collection of quality Clojure libraries created and maintained by the fine folks at Gaiwan.

Pay it forward by becoming a backer on our OpenCollective, so that we continue to enjoy a thriving Clojure ecosystem.

You can find an overview of all our different projects at lambdaisland/open-source.

 

 

License

Copyright © 2018-2026 Taylor Wood, Arne Brasseur, and Contributors

Licensed under the term of the MIT License, see LICENSE.