Deprecated APIs and features

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Angular/docs/9/guide/deprecations


Deprecated APIs and features

Angular strives to balance innovation and stability. Sometimes, APIs and features become obsolete and need to be removed or replaced so that Angular can stay current with new best practices, changing dependencies, or changes in the (web) platform itself.

To make these transitions as easy as possible, we deprecate APIs and features for a period of time before removing them. This gives you time to update your apps to the latest APIs and best practices.

This guide contains a summary of all Angular APIs and features that are currently deprecated.

Features and APIs that were deprecated in v6 or earlier are candidates for removal in version 9 or any later major version. For information about Angular's deprecation and removal practices, see Angular Release Practices.

For step-by-step instructions on how to update to the latest Angular release, use the interactive update guide at update.angular.io.

Index

To help you future-proof your apps, the following table lists all deprecated APIs and features, organized by the release in which they are candidates for removal. Each item is linked to the section later in this guide that describes the deprecation reason and replacement options.

Area API or Feature May be removed in
@angular/common ReflectiveInjector v10
@angular/common CurrencyPipe - DEFAULT_CURRENCY_CODE v11
@angular/core CollectionChangeRecord v10
@angular/core DefaultIterableDiffer v10
@angular/core ReflectiveKey v10
@angular/core RenderComponentType v10
@angular/core ViewEncapsulation.Native v10
@angular/core ModuleWithProviders without a generic v10
@angular/core Undecorated base classes that use Angular features v10
@angular/forms ngModel with reactive forms v10
@angular/router preserveQueryParams v10
@angular/upgrade @angular/upgrade v10
@angular/upgrade getAngularLib v10
@angular/upgrade setAngularLib v10
@angular/platform-webworker All entry points v10
template syntax <template> v10
polyfills reflect-metadata v10
npm package format esm5 and fesm5 entry-points in @angular/* npm packages v10
@angular/core defineInjectable v11
@angular/core entryComponents v11
@angular/core ANALYZE_FOR_ENTRY_COMPONENTS v11
@angular/router loadChildren string syntax v11
@angular/core/testing TestBed.get v12
@angular/router ActivatedRoute params and queryParams properties unspecified
template syntax /deep/, >>>, and ::ng-deep unspecified

Deprecated APIs

This section contains a complete list all of the currently-deprecated APIs, with details to help you plan your migration to a replacement.

Tip: In the API reference section of this doc site, deprecated APIs are indicated by strikethrough. You can filter the API list by Status: deprecated.

@angular/common

API Replacement Deprecation announced Notes
CurrencyPipe - DEFAULT_CURRENCY_CODE {provide: DEFAULT_CURRENCY_CODE, useValue: 'USD'} v9 From v11 the default code will be extracted from the locale data given by LOCAL_ID, rather than USD.

@angular/core

API Replacement Deprecation announced Notes
CollectionChangeRecord IterableChangeRecord v4 none
DefaultIterableDiffer n/a v4 Not part of public API.
ReflectiveInjector Injector.create v5 See ReflectiveInjector
ReflectiveKey none v5 none
ViewEncapsulation.Native ViewEncapsulation.ShadowDom v6 Use the native encapsulation mechanism of the renderer. See view.ts.
defineInjectable ɵɵdefineInjectable v8 Used only in generated code. No source code should depend on this API.
entryComponents none v9 See entryComponents
ANALYZE_FOR_ENTRY_COMPONENTS none v9 See ANALYZE_FOR_ENTRY_COMPONENTS
ModuleWithProviders without a generic ModuleWithProviders with a generic v9 See ModuleWithProviders section
Undecorated base classes that use Angular features Base classes with @Directive() decorator that use Angular features v9 See undecorated base classes section

@angular/core/testing

API Replacement Deprecation announced Notes
TestBed.get TestBed.inject v9 Same behavior, but type safe.

@angular/forms

API Replacement Deprecation announced Notes
ngModel with reactive forms FormControlDirective v6 none

@angular/router

API Replacement Deprecation announced Notes
preserveQueryParams queryParamsHandling v4 none

@angular/platform-webworker

API Replacement Deprecation announced Notes
All entry points none v8 See platform-webworker.

@angular/platform-webworker-dynamic

API Replacement Deprecation announced Notes
All entry points none v8 See platform-webworker.

@angular/upgrade

API Replacement Deprecation announced Notes
All entry points @angular/upgrade/static v5 See Upgrading from AngularJS.

@angular/upgrade/static

API Replacement Deprecation announced Notes
getAngularLib getAngularJSGlobal v5 See Upgrading from AngularJS.
setAngularLib setAngularJSGlobal v5 See Upgrading from AngularJS.

Deprecated features

This section lists all of the currently-deprecated features, which includes template syntax, configuration options, and any other deprecations not listed in the Deprecated APIs section above. It also includes deprecated API usage scenarios or API combinations, to augment the information above.

Web Tracing Framework integration

Angular previously has supported an integration with the Web Tracing Framework (WTF) for performance testing of Angular applications. This integration has not been maintained and defunct. As a result, the integration was deprecated in Angular version 8 and due to no evidence of any existing usage removed in version 9.

/deep/, >>> and :ng-deep component style selectors

The shadow-dom-piercing descendant combinator is deprecated and support is being removed from major browsers and tools. As such, in v4 we deprecated support in Angular for all 3 of /deep/, >>> and ::ng-deep. Until removal, ::ng-deep is preferred for broader compatibility with the tools.

For more information, see /deep/, >>>, and ::ng-deep in the Component Styles guide.

The <template> tag was deprecated in v4 to avoid colliding with the DOM's element of the same name (such as when using web components). Use <ng-template> instead. For more information, see the Ahead-of-Time Compilation guide.

ngModel with reactive forms

Support for using the ngModel input property and ngModelChange event with reactive form directives has been deprecated in Angular v6 and will be removed in a future version of Angular.

Now deprecated:

<input [formControl]="control" [(ngModel)]="value">
this.value = 'some value';

This has been deprecated for several reasons. First, developers have found this pattern confusing. It seems like the actual ngModel directive is being used, but in fact it's an input/output property named ngModel on the reactive form directive that approximates some, but not all, of the directive's behavior. It allows getting and setting a value and intercepting value events, but some of ngModel's other features, such as delaying updates withngModelOptions or exporting the directive, don't work.

In addition, this pattern mixes template-driven and reactive forms strategies, which prevents taking advantage of the full benefits of either strategy. Setting the value in the template violates the template-agnostic principles behind reactive forms, whereas adding a FormControl/FormGroup layer in the class removes the convenience of defining forms in the template.

To update your code before support is removed, you'll want to decide whether to stick with reactive form directives (and get/set values using reactive forms patterns) or switch over to template-driven directives.

After (choice 1 - use reactive forms):

<input [formControl]="control">
this.control.setValue('some value');

After (choice 2 - use template-driven forms):

<input [(ngModel)]="value">
this.value = 'some value';

By default, when you use this pattern, you will see a deprecation warning once in dev mode. You can choose to silence this warning by providing a config for ReactiveFormsModule at import time:

imports: [
  ReactiveFormsModule.withConfig({warnOnNgModelWithFormControl: 'never'});
]

Alternatively, you can choose to surface a separate warning for each instance of this pattern with a config value of "always". This may help to track down where in the code the pattern is being used as the code is being updated.

ReflectiveInjector

In v5, Angular replaced the ReflectiveInjector with the StaticInjector. The injector no longer requires the Reflect polyfill, reducing application size for most developers.

Before:

ReflectiveInjector.resolveAndCreate(providers);

After:

Injector.create({providers});

loadChildren string syntax

When Angular first introduced lazy routes, there wasn't browser support for dynamically loading additional JavaScript. Angular created our own scheme using the syntax loadChildren: './lazy/lazy.module#LazyModule' and built tooling to support it. Now that ECMAScript dynamic import is supported in many browsers, Angular is moving toward this new syntax.

In version 8, the string syntax for the loadChildren route specification was deprecated, in favor of new syntax that uses import() syntax.

Before:

const routes: Routes = [{
  path: 'lazy',
  // The following string syntax for loadChildren is deprecated
  loadChildren: './lazy/lazy.module#LazyModule'
}];

After:

const routes: Routes = [{
  path: 'lazy',
  // The new import() syntax
  loadChildren: () => import('./lazy/lazy.module').then(m => m.LazyModule)
}];

Version 8 update: When you update to version 8, the ng update command performs the transformation automatically. Prior to version 7, the import() syntax only works in JIT mode (with view engine).

Declaration syntax: It's important to follow the route declaration syntax loadChildren: () => import('...').then(m => m.ModuleName) to allow ngc to discover the lazy-loaded module and the associated NgModule. You can find the complete list of allowed syntax constructs here. These restrictions will be relaxed with the release of Ivy since it'll no longer use NgFactories.

ActivatedRoute params and queryParams properties

ActivatedRoute contains two properties that are less capable than their replacements and may be deprecated in a future Angular version.

Property Replacement
params paramMap
queryParams queryParamMap

For more information see the Getting route information section of the Router guide.

Dependency on a reflect-metadata polyfill in JIT mode

Angular applications, and specifically applications that relied on the JIT compiler, used to require a polyfill for the reflect-metadata APIs.

The need for this polyfill was removed in Angular version 8.0 (see #14473), rendering the presence of the poylfill in most Angular applications unnecessary. Because the polyfill can be depended on by 3rd-party libraries, instead of removing it from all Angular projects, we are deprecating the requirement for this polyfill as of version 8.0. This should give library authors and application developers sufficient time to evaluate if they need the polyfill, and perform any refactoring necessary to remove the dependency on it.

In a typical Angular project, the polyfill is not used in production builds, so removing it should not impact production applications. The goal behind this removal is overall simplification of the build setup and decrease in the number of external dependencies.

@ViewChild() / @ContentChild() static resolution as the default

See the dedicated migration guide for static queries.

@ContentChild() / @Input() used together

The following pattern is deprecated:

@Input() @ContentChild(TemplateRef) tpl !: TemplateRef<any>;

Rather than using this pattern, separate the two decorators into their own properties and add fallback logic as in the following example:

@Input() tpl !: TemplateRef<any>;
@ContentChild(TemplateRef) inlineTemplate !: TemplateRef<any>;

Cannot assign to template variables

In the following example, the two-way binding means that optionName should be written when the valueChange event fires.

<option *ngFor="let optionName of options" [(value)]="optionName"></option>

However, in practice, Angular simply ignores two-way bindings to template variables. Starting in version 8, attempting to write to template variables is deprecated. In a future version, we will throw to indicate that the write is not supported.

<option *ngFor="let optionName of options" [value]="optionName"></option>

Undecorated base classes using Angular features

As of version 9, it's deprecated to have an undecorated base class that:

  • uses Angular features
  • is extended by a directive or component

Angular lifecycle hooks or any of the following Angular field decorators are considered Angular features:

  • @Input()
  • @Output()
  • @HostBinding()
  • @HostListener()
  • @ViewChild() / @ViewChildren()
  • @ContentChild() / @ContentChildren()

For example, the following case is deprecated because the base class uses @Input() and does not have a class-level decorator:

class Base {
  @Input()
  foo: string;
}

@Directive(...)
class Dir extends Base {
  ngOnChanges(): void {
    // notified when bindings to [foo] are updated
  }
}

In a future version of Angular, this code will start to throw an error. To fix this example, add a selectorless @Directive() decorator to the base class:

@Directive()
class Base {
  @Input()
  foo: string;
}

@Directive(...)
class Dir extends Base {
  ngOnChanges(): void {
    // notified when bindings to [foo] are updated
  }
}

In version 9, the CLI has an automated migration that will update your code for you when ng update is run. See the dedicated migration guide for more information about the change and more examples.

Binding to innerText in platform-server

Domino, which is used in server-side rendering, doesn't support innerText, so in platform-server's "domino adapter", there was special code to fall back to textContent if you tried to bind to innerText.

These two properties have subtle differences, so switching to textContent under the hood can be surprising to users. For this reason, we are deprecating this behavior. Going forward, users should explicitly bind to textContent when using Domino.

wtfStartTimeRange and all wtf* APIs

All of the wtf* APIs are deprecated and will be removed in a future version.

Running Angular applications in platform-webworker

The @angular/platform-* packages enable Angular to be run in different contexts. For examples, @angular/platform-server enables Angular to be run on the server, and @angular/platform-browser enables Angular to be run in a web browser.

@angular/platform-webworker was introduced in Angular version 2 as an experiment in leveraging Angular's rendering architecture to run an entire web application in a web worker. We've learned a lot from this experiment and have come to the conclusion that running the entire application in a web worker is not the best strategy for most applications.

Going forward, we will focus our efforts related to web workers around their primary use case of offloading CPU-intensive, non-critical work needed for initial rendering (such as in-memory search and image processing). Learn more in the guide to Using Web Workers with the Angular CLI.

As of Angular version 8, all platform-webworker APIs are deprecated. This includes both packages: @angular/platform-webworker and @angular/platform-webworker-dynamic.

entryComponents and ANALYZE_FOR_ENTRY_COMPONENTS no longer required

Previously, the entryComponents array in the NgModule definition was used to tell the compiler which components would be created and inserted dynamically. With Ivy, this isn't a requirement anymore and the entryComponents array can be removed from existing module declarations. The same applies to the ANALYZE_FOR_ENTRY_COMPONENTS injection token.

ModuleWithProviders type without a generic

Some Angular libraries, such as @angular/router and @ngrx/store, implement APIs that return a type called ModuleWithProviders (typically via a method named forRoot()). This type represents an NgModule along with additional providers. Angular version 9 deprecates use of ModuleWithProviders without an explicitly generic type, where the generic type refers to the type of the NgModule. In a future version of Angular, the generic will no longer be optional.

If you're using the CLI, ng update should migrate your code automatically. If you're not using the CLI, you can add any missing generic types to your application manually. For example:

Before

@NgModule({...})
export class MyModule {
  static forRoot(config: SomeConfig): ModuleWithProviders {
    return {
      ngModule: SomeModule,
      providers: [
        {provide: SomeConfig, useValue: config}
      ]
    };
  }
}

After

@NgModule({...})
export class MyModule {
  static forRoot(config: SomeConfig): ModuleWithProviders<SomeModule> {
    return {
      ngModule: SomeModule,
      providers: [
        {provide: SomeConfig, useValue: config }
      ]
    };
  }
}

esm5 and fesm5 code formats in @angular/* npm packages

As of Angular v8, the CLI primarily consumes the fesm2015 variant of the code distributed via @angular/* npm packages. This renders the esm5 and fesm5 distributions obsolete and unnecessary, adding bloat to the package size and slowing down npm installations.

The future removal of this distribution will have no impact on CLI users, unless they modified their build configuration to explicitly consume these code distributions.

Any application still relying on the esm5 and fesm5 as the input to its build system will need to ensure that the build pipeline is capable of accepting JavaScript code conforming to ECMAScript 2015 (ES2015) language specification.

Note that this change doesn't make existing libraries distributed in this format incompatible with the Angular CLI. The CLI will fall back and consume libraries in less desirable formats if others are not available. However, we do recommend that libraries ship their code in ES2015 format in order to make builds faster and build output smaller.

In practical terms, the package.json of all @angular packages will change in the following way:

Before:

{
  "name": "@angular/core",
  "version": "9.0.0",
  "main": "./bundles/core.umd.js",
  "module": "./fesm5/core.js",
  "es2015": "./fesm2015/core.js",
  "esm5": "./esm5/core.js",
  "esm2015": "./esm2015/core.js",
  "fesm5": "./fesm5/core.js",
  "fesm2015": "./fesm2015/core.js",
  ...
}

After:

{
  "name": "@angular/core",
  "version": "10.0.0",
  "main": "./bundles/core.umd.js",
  "module": "./fesm2015/core.js",
  "es2015": "./fesm2015/core.js",
  "esm2015": "./esm2015/core.js",
  "fesm2015": "./fesm2015/core.js",
  ...
}

For more information about the npm package format, see the Angular Package Format spec.

Removed APIs

The following APIs have been removed starting with version 9.0.0*:

Package API Replacement Notes
@angular/core Renderer Renderer2 Migration guide
@angular/core RootRenderer RendererFactory2 none
@angular/core RenderComponentType RendererType2 none
@angular/core WtfScopeFn none v8
@angular/core wtfCreateScope none v8
@angular/core wtfStartTimeRange none v8
@angular/core wtfEndTimeRange none v8
@angular/core wtfLeave none v8
@angular/common DeprecatedI18NPipesModule CommonModule none
@angular/common DeprecatedCurrencyPipe CurrencyPipe none
@angular/common DeprecatedDatePipe DatePipe none
@angular/common DeprecatedDecimalPipe DecimalPipe none
@angular/common DeprecatedPercentPipe PercentPipe none
@angular/forms NgFormSelectorWarning none none
@angular/forms ngForm element selector ng-form element selector none
@angular/service-worker versionedFiles files In the service worker configuration file ngsw-config.json, replace versionedFiles with files. See Service Worker Configuration.

@angular/http

The entire @angular/http package has been removed. Use @angular/common/http instead.

The new API is a smaller, easier, and more powerful way to make HTTP requests in Angular. The new API simplifies the default ergonomics: There is no need to map by invoking the .json() method. It also supports typed return values and interceptors.

To update your apps:

For more information about using @angular/common/http, see the HttpClient guide.

@angular/http Closest replacement in @angular/common/http
BaseRequestOptions HttpRequest
BaseResponseOptions HttpResponse
BrowserXhr
Connection HttpBackend
ConnectionBackend HttpBackend
CookieXSRFStrategy HttpClientXsrfModule
Headers HttpHeaders
Http HttpClient
HttpModule HttpClientModule
Jsonp HttpClient
JSONPBackend JsonpClientBackend
JSONPConnection JsonpClientBackend
JsonpModule HttpClientJsonpModule
QueryEncoder HttpUrlEncodingCodec
ReadyState HttpBackend
Request HttpRequest
RequestMethod HttpClient
RequestOptions HttpRequest
RequestOptionsArgs HttpRequest
Response HttpResponse
ResponseContentType HttpClient
ResponseOptions HttpResponse
ResponseOptionsArgs HttpResponse
ResponseType HttpClient
URLSearchParams HttpParams
XHRBackend HttpXhrBackend
XHRConnection HttpXhrBackend
XSRFStrategy HttpClientXsrfModule
@angular/http/testing Closest replacement in @angular/common/http/testing
MockBackend HttpTestingController
MockConnection HttpTestingController

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https://v9.angular.io/guide/deprecations