ReferenceError: fetch is not defined

The fetch API is not implemented in Node.

You need to use an external module for that, like node-fetch.

Install it in your Node application like this

npm install node-fetch

then put the line below at the top of the files where you are using the fetch API:

import fetch from "node-fetch";

This is a quick dirty fix, please try to eliminate this usage in production code.

If fetch has to be accessible with a global scope

import fetch from 'node-fetch'
globalThis.fetch = fetch

You can use cross-fetch from @lquixada

Platform agnostic: browsers, node or react native

Install

npm install --save cross-fetch

Usage

With promises:

import fetch from 'cross-fetch';
// Or just: import 'cross-fetch/polyfill';

fetch('//api.github.com/users/lquixada')
  .then(res => {
    if (res.status >= 400) {
      throw new Error("Bad response from server");
    }
    return res.json();
  })
  .then(user => {
    console.log(user);
  })
  .catch(err => {
    console.error(err);
  });

With async/await:

import fetch from 'cross-fetch';
// Or just: import 'cross-fetch/polyfill';

(async () => {
  try {
    const res = await fetch('//api.github.com/users/lquixada');

    if (res.status >= 400) {
      throw new Error("Bad response from server");
    }

    const user = await res.json();

    console.log(user);
  } catch (err) {
    console.error(err);
  }
})();

If you want to avoid npm install and not running in browser, you can also use nodejs https module;

const https = require('https')
const url = "https://jsonmock.hackerrank.com/api/movies";
https.get(url, res => {
  let data = '';
  res.on('data', chunk => {
    data += chunk;
  });
  res.on('end', () => {
    data = JSON.parse(data);
    console.log(data);
  })
}).on('error', err => {
  console.log(err.message);
})