Issue with Tailwind CSS Installation (Version 4.1.11) — Resolved with Version 3.4.1

[prabhatyadav4]

v4.1.11 missing CLI binary — npx tailwindcss init fails with "could not determine executable to run"

What version of Tailwind CSS are you using?

v4.1.11

What build tool (or framework if it abstracts the build tool) are you using?

None – standard npm setup, no additional frameworks or build tools. CLI used manually.

What version of Node.js are you using?

v22.15.0

What browser are you using?

N/A – CLI issue, browser not involved.

What operating system are you using?

Windows 11 (Build 26100)

Describe your issue

Hello Tailwind team,

I’m encountering an issue with Tailwind CSS version v4.1.11 that prevents usage of the CLI via npx. After installing this version in a new project using:

npm install -D [email protected]

… I attempted to run the following:

npx tailwindcss init

However, this consistently fails with the error:

npm ERR! could not determine executable to run

Investigation Findings:

• The tailwindcss binary is missing from the node_modules/.bin directory.

• Running npm view [email protected] bin returns an empty result, indicating that the published package may be missing the bin field in its package.json.

• This behavior is not present in v3.4.1. After downgrading with:

  npm install -D [email protected]
  

  … the CLI binary is correctly registered, and the following works:

  npx tailwindcss init
  

Summary:

It appears that version v4.1.11 of Tailwind CSS was published without the CLI binary entry, which breaks usage via npx, npm exec, or any other CLI-based workflows. This may have been an unintentional omission during publishing.

Please let me know if this was an intentional change or a packaging mistake. If needed, I’m happy to share logs, reproduce this issue further, or help test fixes.

Thanks for your time and continued work on Tailwind!

Best regards,
Prabhat

[wongjn]

The init command no longer exists in the most recent major version of Tailwind. Consider checking the installation documentation that is most relevant to your project to integrate Tailwind CSS properly.