If you're trying to use the await keyword on the top level of your Node.js application, make sure to set the type attribute to module in your package.json file.

If you don't have a package.json file, create one by using the npm init -y command (only if you don't have one already).

npm init -y

Open the package.json file at the root directory of your project and set the type attribute to module.

{
  "type": "module",
  // ... your other settings
}

Now you can use top-level await in your Node.js code.

const result = await Promise.resolve(42);

console.log(result); // 👉️ 42

If you're on the browser, set the type attribute to module on your script tag.

<script type="module" src="index.js"></script>

Now you can use the top-level await syntax on the browser.

const result = await Promise.resolve(42);

console.log(result); // 👉️ 42