docs: caching node_modules vs cache directory

The docs guides to cache .npm or $(yarn cache dir) for nodejs.

Node - npm Node - Yarn

This lets people feel it the “RIGHT” way to cache node dependencies, without clearly explaining whether caching node_modules directly is not recommended.

I want to know 1) if this is a wrong impression or not and 2) why.

Thanks!

[Arxcis]

Yes. I would like to know the answer here as well. From experience caching node_modules/ saves a lot more time, than just caching $(yarn cache dir) 🤔

In my github workflow here are my results from different caching strategies vs no-caching:

yarn install - no-caching	yarn install - cache hit $(yarn cache dir)	yarn install - cache hit node_modules/
1m 50s	1m	1-2s

Up to 60x faster when caching node_modules/ directly vs caching $(yarn cache dir) 🤔

[vsvipul]

This has already been added to Node example at https://github.com/actions/cache/blob/main/examples.md#node---npm . Hence, going ahead and closing this. Thank you for opening this issue.