Why Does JSON File Writing Fail in Packaged Electron App While Reading Works?

It sounds like the issue is related to how paths are resolved when your app is packaged as an executable. In development you’re likely running from your project directory, so the resolved __dirname points to a writable location. However, when you package your app, __dirname can point to a location inside the packaged resources (often within an ASAR archive) which is read‐only. This means:

• Reading from the file may succeed because Electron can extract files from the ASAR archive.
• Writing to the same path fails because the archive is not writable.

A common solution is to store runtime data in a user-specific writable location. Electron provides the app.getPath API for this. For example, you could update your path resolution like this:

JAVASCRIPTCopied
const { app } = require('electron');
const path = require('path');

// Use the userData directory to store runtime files
const envFilePath = path.join(app.getPath('userData'), '.env');

console.log(envFilePath);

By storing your file in the app.getPath('userData') directory, you ensure that both read and write operations are done in a location where your app has the proper permissions, regardless of whether it’s running in development or as a packaged executable.

This approach should resolve the discrepancy you’re seeing.