i can't access binaries.prisma.sh

[ATalitanha]

Question

i can't access binaries.prisma.sh for download prisma engine for node api windows. how can I download it from another source or run without this

• OS: windows
• Database: PostgreSQL
• Node.js version: 22.14.0

prisma@6.19.3

[yudin-s]

If the only problem is that your environment cannot reach binaries.prisma.sh, there are two separate paths depending on what you need.

If you still want the normal Prisma engines, configure your network/proxy to allow that host, or mirror the engine files internally and point Prisma at the mirror:

PRISMA_ENGINES_MIRROR=https://your-internal-mirror.example.com npx prisma generate

That mirror has to serve the same engine files Prisma expects, so this is usually something for a company package/cache infrastructure rather than an app-level workaround.

If your app is on a recent Prisma version and you only want to avoid the Rust query engine at application runtime, you can use the JS/client engine with a driver adapter. For PostgreSQL it looks roughly like this:

generator client {
  provider   = "prisma-client"
  output     = "../generated/prisma"
  engineType = "client"
}

npm install @prisma/adapter-pg

import { PrismaPg } from "@prisma/adapter-pg"
import { PrismaClient } from "../generated/prisma/client"

const adapter = new PrismaPg({
  connectionString: process.env.DATABASE_URL!,
})

export const prisma = new PrismaClient({ adapter })

One important caveat: this helps with the query engine used by your app. Prisma CLI commands such as migrations can still need engine downloads depending on what you run, so in locked-down CI you may still need the allowlist/mirror solution.

[GitNimay]

This is usually a network or proxy access issue, not a PostgreSQL or Node.js issue.

Prisma downloads its engine files from:

https://binaries.prisma.sh

If that domain is blocked by your network, firewall, DNS, antivirus, company proxy, or ISP, Prisma cannot complete prisma generate, prisma migrate, or install time engine downloads.

You have a few options.

1. Fix access to the official Prisma binary host

First check whether Windows can reach it:

Invoke-WebRequest https://binaries.prisma.sh

If you are behind a proxy, configure npm and your environment:

npm config set proxy http://your-proxy-host:port
npm config set https-proxy http://your-proxy-host:port

Then reinstall and generate again:

npm install
npx prisma generate

2. Use a custom mirror

Prisma supports PRISMA_ENGINES_MIRROR. This lets you point Prisma to another server that hosts the same engine files.

For PowerShell:

$env:PRISMA_ENGINES_MIRROR="https://your-mirror.example.com"
npm install
npx prisma generate

Or in .env:

PRISMA_ENGINES_MIRROR=https://your-mirror.example.com

Important: this mirror must contain the correct Prisma engine files for your Prisma version and platform. It is not enough to point it to any random CDN. The files need to match the engine commit used by prisma@6.19.3.

You can see the exact engine commit and platform Prisma expects by running:

npx prisma -v

3. Manually provide the engine path

If you can download the engine from another machine that has access, copy it to your Windows machine and point Prisma to it.

For the Node API library engine, set:

$env:PRISMA_QUERY_ENGINE_LIBRARY="C:\path\to\query_engine-windows.dll.node"
npx prisma generate

For the binary engine, use:

$env:PRISMA_QUERY_ENGINE_BINARY="C:\path\to\query-engine-windows.exe"
npx prisma generate

Make sure the file matches the exact Prisma engine version expected by your installed Prisma package.

4. Run Prisma without Rust engine binaries

If you want to avoid downloading the Prisma query engine binary entirely, use Prisma’s JavaScript driver adapter setup. For PostgreSQL, that usually means using the pg driver adapter.

Install the adapter:

npm install @prisma/adapter-pg pg

Then configure Prisma Client to use the adapter in your application code. This removes the need for the Rust query engine at runtime, but you may still need Prisma CLI access for commands like migrations depending on your setup.

Most practical fix

For your case, I would first solve access to binaries.prisma.sh or configure PRISMA_ENGINES_MIRROR. That is the normal path for prisma@6.19.3 on Windows.

If this is a company or restricted network, ask the network admin to allow:

https://binaries.prisma.sh

Then delete node_modules and reinstall:

Remove-Item -Recurse -Force node_modules
Remove-Item -Force package-lock.json
npm install
npx prisma generate

[aymenhmaidiwastaken]

If binaries.prisma.sh is blocked in your network, you can download the engines manually and point Prisma to them.

Option 1 — Use a custom binary mirror:

Set this environment variable before running prisma generate:

set PRISMA_ENGINES_MIRROR=https://binaries.prisma.sh

If the domain itself is blocked, try accessing it through a VPN or proxy. You can also configure npm/Node to use a proxy:

set HTTPS_PROXY=http://your-proxy:port
npm install
npx prisma generate

Option 2 — Download engines manually:

1. Find your engine version: run npx prisma version (or check node_modules/@prisma/engines-version)
2. Download from another machine that has access:

   https://binaries.prisma.sh/all_commits/<hash>/windows/query_engine.dll.node
   https://binaries.prisma.sh/all_commits/<hash>/windows/schema_engine.exe
   https://binaries.prisma.sh/all_commits/<hash>/windows/prisma-fmt.exe
   

3. Place them in node_modules/@prisma/engines/
4. Set PRISMA_QUERY_ENGINE_BINARY, PRISMA_SCHEMA_ENGINE_BINARY env vars pointing to the files

Option 3 — Use the WASM engine (Prisma 6+):

Prisma 6+ bundles a WASM-based query engine that doesn't need a separate binary download:

generator client {
  provider = "prisma-client-js"
  engineType = "wasm"
}

This bypasses the binary download entirely.

[logusivam]

This is a known, recurring issue with binaries.prisma.sh — by design, Prisma's CLI/Client downloads native query engine binaries from this domain at install/generate time, and access to it can fail due to network restrictions (corporate proxies, firewalls, regional blocking, or occasional outages on Prisma's side). The fix depends on which of these is causing your specific failure.

---

Step 1 — Confirm whether it's a network/proxy issue or the domain itself being down

Test direct access from your machine:

curl -I https://binaries.prisma.sh

• Connection refused / timeout / DNS failure → you're behind a proxy or firewall blocking the domain (common on corporate networks, certain ISPs, or regions with DNS filtering).
• 403 or 404 response → this is occasionally a transient issue on Prisma's CDN side, not your network. Check the Prisma GitHub issues for an open report matching the date.

---

Fix 1 — Configure a proxy if you're behind one

If you're on a corporate network or behind a proxy, set the standard proxy environment variables before running any Prisma command:

$env:HTTP_PROXY  = "http://your-proxy-host:port"
$env:HTTPS_PROXY = "http://your-proxy-host:port"

npx prisma generate

If your proxy requires authentication:

$env:HTTPS_PROXY = "http://username:password@your-proxy-host:port"

---

Fix 2 — Use a mirror via PRISMA_ENGINES_MIRROR

Prisma supports redirecting binary downloads to a mirror you control or a known alternative, using an environment variable:

$env:PRISMA_ENGINES_MIRROR = "https://your-mirror-url"
npx prisma generate

⚠️ Setting up your own mirror requires hosting the exact same gzip + checksum file structure Prisma expects (<engine>.gz and <engine>.gz.sha256). Be aware this has a known gotcha: if you point this at a generic file server like Artifactory, the server generates its own checksums for the gzipped file, but Prisma's download script also tries to fetch a checksum for the un-gzipped file — which the mirror never generates — causing checksum validation to fail even though the binary downloaded successfully. If you go this route and hit checksum errors, that mismatch is almost certainly why.

---

Fix 3 — Skip the download by using Data Proxy / Accelerate instead (no engine binaries needed)

If your goal is just to get unblocked rather than to fix the network access itself, Prisma's Accelerate / Data Proxy connection mode does not require downloading native query engine binaries at all, since queries are proxied through Prisma's edge infrastructure instead of running through a local engine. This sidesteps the binary download problem entirely, but requires setting up a Prisma Accelerate or Data Proxy connection string instead of a direct PostgreSQL connection — which is a bigger architectural change, so only go this route if a long-term fix for direct binary access isn't feasible for you.

---

Fix 4 — Manually download and place the binary (last resort, version-pinned)

You can manually download the correct engine binary for Windows and Node-API, then point Prisma at it directly, bypassing the automatic download step.

1. Find your exact engine commit hash for prisma@6.19.3 — check node_modules/@prisma/engines-version/package.json or the Prisma GitHub release tag matching 6.19.3.
2. Try downloading the binary directly via browser (sometimes works even when the CLI's automated request fails due to user-agent or header differences):

   https://binaries.prisma.sh/all_commits/<commit-hash>/windows/libquery_engine.dll.node.gz

3. If the browser also can't reach binaries.prisma.sh, the domain itself is blocked for you (DNS or firewall level) — in that case Fix 1 or Fix 2 are the only real paths forward, since there's no officially supported alternate CDN.
4. Once downloaded and unzipped, set the engine path explicitly:

   $env:PRISMA_QUERY_ENGINE_LIBRARY = "C:\path\to\libquery_engine.dll.node"

---

Why this happens repeatedly across the Prisma community

This is not unique to you — other users on Windows behind a corporate proxy have hit the same ECONNREFUSED error trying to reach binaries.prisma.sh, and there have been reports of outright 403 errors when calling the binaries.prisma.sh endpoint directly, independent of any user's network setup. There is a long-standing open feature request asking Prisma to support a configurable CDN URL via an environment variable, with the stated rationale that the CLI tries to download binaries from Prisma's S3 bucket and in some environments this download fails — PRISMA_ENGINES_MIRROR (Fix 2) is the current implementation of that ask, but it isn't perfectly transparent, as the checksum issue above shows.

---

Recommended order to try

Step	Try this first if...
Fix 1 (Proxy)	You're on a corporate/restricted network and curl to the domain fails with connection errors
Fix 2 (Mirror)	You have or can set up your own artifact mirror and are comfortable debugging checksum issues
Fix 3 (Accelerate/Data Proxy)	You want to permanently avoid engine binary downloads going forward
Fix 4 (Manual download)	You just need to unblock this one install and can reach the domain via browser even if the CLI can't

Hope this helps — if it answers your question, would you mind closing this out or marking it resolved so others searching for the same thing can find it quickly?