TypeDoc is the canonical documentation generator for TypeScript projects. Created by Sebastian Lenz, it has become the default tool for producing API reference sites for open-source TypeScript libraries, internal SDKs, and design system component libraries. Unlike documentation tools that require separate annotation languages, TypeDoc reads ordinary JSDoc-style comments directly from .ts source files and uses the TypeScript compiler API to resolve types — meaning function signatures, generics, interfaces, and exported symbols are extracted from the source of truth rather than duplicated by hand.
Out of the box, TypeDoc produces a static HTML site with a sidebar tree of modules, classes, functions, and enums; deep links into each declaration; cross-references between related types; and configurable navigation. Built-in themes (default, light, and dark) can be replaced by community themes — typedoc-material-theme and typedoc-theme-hierarchy are popular — or extended with custom render hooks and plugins. Output formats include HTML, JSON (for downstream pipelines), and Markdown via plugins, making it straightforward to publish on GitHub Pages, Vercel, or alongside a Docusaurus or VitePress handbook.
TypeDoc is MIT licensed and free, with no hosted service or paid tier — it runs as a CLI in CI pipelines, typically wired into pre-publish or post-build steps. Configuration lives in tsconfig.json or a typedoc.json file; common options handle entry points, monorepo packages, exclude patterns, and JSDoc tag handling. For TypeScript library authors who want reference docs that stay in sync with their actual exported types — without writing a separate documentation file for every function — TypeDoc remains the standard choice in 2026.
