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# Nix as a WebAssembly build tool

**[Determinate Systems](https://daily.dev/sources/determinate-systems)** · 5 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments

## Summary

Using Nix as a build tool for WebAssembly addresses the complexity of Wasm toolchains, which span multiple languages, runtimes, and utilities. A practical example project compiles a Rust program to WASI-compliant Wasm using a custom Nix function wrapping Naersk's buildPackage. The approach produces a full Wasm package including the binary, objdump metadata, stats, and a human-readable WAT file — all built deterministically. Nix also enables wrapping Wasm binaries as CLI tools by bundling runtimes like Wasmtime or WasmEdge via makeWrapper, eliminating the need for apt-get or Homebrew. The post argues Nix is better suited than Makefiles or Bash for Wasm packaging and would remain relevant even in a world that has moved beyond containers and VMs.

## Full article

daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: <https://determinate.systems/blog/nix-wasm>

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---

Tags: [#webdev](https://daily.dev/tags/webdev), [#rust](https://daily.dev/tags/rust), [#webassembly](https://daily.dev/tags/webassembly)

[View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/nix-as-a-webassembly-build-tool-o5zfgjbnl)

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