Running tests for single project outside root directory

[craigmarker]

I'm working on a monorepo and just learned about vitest Test Projects. I relocated my existing packages/core/vitest.config and packages/rpc/vitest.config into the root vite.config.

I'm trying to run the core tests from packages/core, but neither vitest -c ../../vitest.config.ts --project core nor vitest --project core work.

My goal is to avoid merging shared configuration because my packages/core/tsconfig.json configures compilerOptions.rootDir=".".

What am I missing?

Here's my single vitest.config.ts in the root directory.

// vitest.config.ts - Root configuration with projects
import { defineConfig } from 'vitest/config';

export default defineConfig({
  test: {
    globals: true,
    silent: 'passed-only',
    env: {
      TZ: 'UTC',
    },
    projects: [
      {
        extends: true,

        test: {
          name: 'core',
          environment: 'jsdom', // Simulate a browser environment for React components
          include: ['packages/core/**/__tests__/**/*.{ts,tsx}'],
          setupFiles: ['./packages/core/test-setup.ts'],
          deps: {
            optimizer: {
              web: {
                enabled: true,
              },
            },
          },
        },
      },
      {
        extends: true,

        test: {
          name: 'rpc',
          environment: 'node',
          include: ['packages/rpc/**/__tests__/**/*.{ts,tsx}'],
        },
      },
    ],
  },
});

[Icaro0310]

--root is what you want, not -c:

vitest --root ../.. --project core

-c only changes where vitest reads the config file from, your cwd still drives root resolution, so the project include globs break. --root makes vitest treat the repo root as the working directory, so it finds your root config, resolves the project definitions, and the core project's own root (packages/core) still applies for test discovery.

Then in packages/core/package.json you can add "test": "vitest --root ../.. --project core" and pnpm --filter core test works from anywhere.

The other common pattern is just running everything from the root and using --project core there, plus turborepo/nx filtering if you want per-package tasks.

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More of my work lives here: github.com/Icaro0310 · Website: icaro0310.github.io