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2 title: About the public npm registry
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4
5 The public npm registry is a database of JavaScript packages, each comprised of software and metadata. Open source developers and developers at companies use the npm registry to contribute packages to the entire community or members of their organizations, and download packages to use in their own projects.
6
7 To get started with the registry, [sign up for an npm account][signup] and check out the "[Getting started][getting-started]" and [CLI][cli] documentation.
8
9 [public-website]: https://npmjs.com
10 [cli]: /cli-documentation
11 [signup]: https://www.npmjs.com/signup
12 [getting-started]: /getting-started