Special offer. See more information about Outbyte and uninstall instructions. Please review EULA and Privacy policy.

Eleventy 2.0.0 brought incremental builds, a new development server, bundled plugins, and support for WebC, Edge, and Vite. The stable release arrived on February 8, 2023. Its performance figures are project-reported results from one sample site—not a promise that every Eleventy project will build faster.

What’s new in Eleventy 2?

Eleventy 2.0.0 is a stable release, announced by the Eleventy project on February 8, 2023. It expands the tools available in the core ecosystem while keeping Eleventy’s focus on generating sites from multiple template languages rather than requiring a client-side JavaScript framework. Eleventy’s v2.0.0 release announcement describes the changes.

Incremental builds and watch behavior

Incremental builds can avoid regenerating every output when only part of a site changes, making them useful during development on projects where a full rebuild takes time. The release also added --ignore-initial, an option relevant to watch workflows. The practical benefit depends on a project’s templates, data, and build setup; the release announcement does not establish one expected speedup for all sites.

Development server, WebC, and Edge

Eleventy Dev Server replaced Browsersync as the project’s development server. Version 2 also added WebC support and Eleventy Edge, broadening the available approaches to components and dynamic rendering. Edge rendering is an option, not a requirement for building a conventional static site.

Special offer. See more information about Outbyte and uninstall instructions. Please review EULA and Privacy policy.

Bundled plugins and Vite

The release bundled plugins for rendering, internationalization, and HTML <base> support, and added support for the Vite plugin. These additions strengthen the tooling available around Eleventy without making a client-side framework a prerequisite. Netlify describes Eleventy as supporting multiple template languages and not being tied to a client-side JavaScript framework; that flexibility does not guarantee that every framework or plugin combination will work unchanged. Netlify’s Eleventy documentation also covers deployment configuration and its Eleventy Edge plugin.

Configuration, templates, and plugin APIs

Other additions and refinements include configurable configuration-file names—eleventy.config.js and eleventy.config.cjs, alongside .eleventy.js—and template-language aliasing. With configuration such as esbuild-register, aliasing can enable TypeScript or JSX. The release also improved async support for shortcodes and filters, added the addAsyncFilter API method, separated processing and watch ignore APIs, improved pagination memory use, expanded passthrough-copy options, and added event arguments for plugin authors. Custom data formats gained support for binary files.

How much faster is Eleventy 2?

Eleventy’s 2023 announcement reports build-time improvements on a sample 500-page site compared with Eleventy v1.0.2. The figures below are the project’s own benchmark results, not an independent test or a guarantee for other sites.

Template or measure Reported change Comparison scope
Liquid build 18.18% faster Eleventy project’s sample 500-page site, v2.0.0 versus v1.0.2; 2023 announcement
Nunjucks build 17.74% faster Eleventy project’s sample 500-page site, v2.0.0 versus v1.0.2; 2023 announcement
Markdown with Liquid 17.95% faster Eleventy project’s sample 500-page site, v2.0.0 versus v1.0.2; 2023 announcement
JavaScript templates (11ty.js) 8.33% faster Eleventy project’s sample 500-page site, v2.0.0 versus v1.0.2; 2023 announcement
Dependency count 32.1% fewer modules: 211, down from 311 Eleventy project comparison of v2.0.0 with v1.0.2; 2023 announcement
node_modules file weight 77.8% lower: 34.3 MB, down from 155 MB Eleventy project comparison of v2.0.0 with v1.0.2; 2023 announcement
npm install time 30.5% faster Eleventy project-reported comparison; 2023 announcement

These results are useful as evidence of what the project measured under its stated comparison, but they do not predict an individual site’s build time. Your templates, data processing, dependencies, and environment can affect the outcome.

Special offer. See more information about Outbyte and uninstall instructions. Please review EULA and Privacy policy.

How do I upgrade to Eleventy 2?

Before upgrading, check the runtime and behaviors your project relies on. Several changes can affect existing sites even if their configuration still runs.

Check the Node.js requirement

Eleventy 2 raised the minimum supported Node.js version to 14. Confirm that the Node runtime used locally and in your deployment environment meets that requirement.

Review Markdown and file-name behavior

  • Indented code blocks in Markdown are disabled by default in v2. Check pages that rely on indented blocks and adjust the Markdown configuration or content as needed.
  • page.fileSlug changed for dated parent directories containing index.*. Verify generated URLs or templates that depend on those slugs.
  • Handling of dots in global data filenames changed. Check data files with dotted names and any templates that read them.

Find removed features and flags

  • The deprecated renderData feature was removed; the release notes point users to Computed Data as an alternative.
  • Global JSON data files are no longer preprocessed with a template language.
  • The --passthroughall flag was removed.

Search your configuration, scripts, and templates for these features before switching versions so you can replace or remove dependent behavior.

Check dependency compatibility

Major dependency updates included liquidjs v9 to v10, luxon v2 to v3, and markdown-it v12 to v13. If your project uses these packages directly or depends on behavior from the previous major versions, review their compatibility and test affected templates.

Special offer. See more information about Outbyte and uninstall instructions. Please review EULA and Privacy policy.

Use the upgrade helper, then test your site

The Eleventy announcement recommends the eleventy-upgrade-helper plugin to identify which listed breaking changes apply to a project. Treat it as a project-specific check, not as an automatic migration or a guarantee that an upgrade is risk-free. After addressing reported issues, run a full build and inspect the output that matters to your site, especially URLs, Markdown pages, global data, and passthrough files.

Rank #4
GSC International N-00029 Generator Electrostatic High-Voltage Genecon Generator This Highly Portable and Visually Engaging Tool Makes Exploring Static Electricity Phenomena straightforward.
  • Innovative Design for Static Electricity Demonstrations This portable, hand-held generator replaces traditional Van de Graaff generators, offering a modern and accessible way to perform static electricity experiments. Its transparent body lets educators and students observe the mechanics of static charge generation without reliance on batteries or motors.
  • Versatile and Effective in All Conditions Designed to function efficiently even in high humidity and heat, the Static Genecon allows educators to conduct demonstrations in diverse environments. The separation of positive and negative charges through red and black cables simplifies understanding and experimentation with static electricity concepts.
  • Safe, Cost-Effective, and Easy to Maintain With no motor, battery, or significant maintenance requirements, this device is economical and hassle-free. In case of wear, only the internal gear set needs replacing, making it a sustainable choice for classrooms.
  • Comprehensive Educational Utility Demonstrate foundational principles such as charge polarity, electrostatic attraction, and repulsion. Students easily grasp these concepts as the generator visibly illustrates friction-based charge production and electrostatic induction through simple operation.
  • Engaging for Teachers and Learners Alike Teachers appreciate the generator's adaptability, enabling experiments that align with curriculum standards. For students, observing and manipulating static electricity with the Genecon deepens understanding through direct, hands-on interaction.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Support on Ko-Fi

Is Eleventy 2 the right upgrade for your project?

The strongest reasons to consider v2 are a need for incremental builds, the new development server, or one of its bundled integrations. The case is less compelling if your current setup works well and depends on behaviors that changed or were removed. Decide based on your Node runtime, template languages and dependencies, the migration checks above, and whether the new capabilities solve a real need.

Eleventy 2.0.0 is a 2023 release; these sources do not establish which Eleventy version is latest in 2026. For deployment, Netlify documents build settings and framework detection, as well as its Eleventy Edge plugin. That is one deployment option, not a requirement to use Eleventy. See Netlify’s Eleventy setup guidance.

Product prices and availability are accurate as of the date/time indicated and are subject to change. Any price and availability information displayed on Amazon at the time of purchase will apply.

Special offer. See more information about Outbyte and uninstall instructions. Please review EULA and Privacy policy.