Why is neovim unable to locate the packer module?

[wjyoumans]

I'm trying to install packer.nvim using the quickstart guide. I cloned the repository using

git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/wbthomason/packer.nvim\
 ~/.local/share/nvim/site/pack/packer/start/packer.nvim

and created the file ~/.config/nvim/lua/plugins.lua with these contents:

return require('packer').startup(function()
  -- Packer can manage itself
  use 'wbthomason/packer.nvim'
end)

My ~/.config/nvim/init.vim has only the line lua require('plugins').

When I run nvim I get the following error:

Error detected while processing /home/user/.config/nvim/init.vim:
line    1:
E5105: Error while calling lua chunk: /home/user/.config/nvim/lua/plugins.lua:6: module 'packer' not found:
        no field package.preload['packer']
        no file '/home/user/.config/nvim/lua/packer.lua'
        no file '/home/user/.config/nvim/lua/packer/init.lua'
        no file '/etc/xdg/xdg-i3/nvim/lua/packer.lua'
        ... (many more missing files)

I tried checking my packpath in neovim with :set packpath? but I'm not sure whether it's correct or not.

packpath=~/.config/nvim,/etc/xdg/xdg-i3/nvim,/etc/xdg/nvim,~/.local/share/nvim/site,/usr/share/i3/nvi
m/site,/usr/local/share/nvim/site,/usr/share/nvim/site,/var/lib/snapd/desktop/nvim/site,/usr/share/nvim
/runtime,/var/lib/snapd/desktop/nvim/site/after,/usr/share/nvim/site/after,/usr/local/share/nvim/site/a
fter,/usr/share/i3/nvim/site/after,~/.local/share/nvim/site/after,/etc/xdg/nvim/after,/etc/xdg/xdg-i3/n
vim/after,~/.config/nvim/after

What am I doing wrong?

[VesperQuartz]

I am facing the same issue too

[goacmola]

just run it from PowerShell if you on windows

[yogeshelke]

I was facing same issue....
followed this : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rH_JL3qil0

Error is gone for me

[yi-ye-zhi-qiu]

Was having the same issue. Just had to upgrade my neovim to 0.5+. I did not realize I was on 0.4.

The in-depth steps I used to solve this problem:

For me make sure your neovim --version => 0.5+,
if on Ubuntu first remove neovim
sudo apt-get remove neovim
then reinstall
sudo apt-get install neovim
confirm version
nvim--version (should be v0.5+)

If this condition is satisfied, install Packer using the normal commands for unix/linux:

git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/wbthomason/packer.nvim\
 ~/.local/share/nvim/site/pack/packer/start/packer.nvim

You can then configure lua based neovim(0.5+) by, in ~/.config/nvim/ directory folder, creating the below file:
~/.config/nvim/init.lua
Inside this file you can add some stuff like:

-- Change tab to be 2 spaces not 8
vim.bo.expandtab = true
vim.bo.shiftwidth = 2
vim.bo.softtabstop = 2

-- Packer
require('packer').startup(function()
  use 'wbthomason/packer.nvim'
end)

You may verify the installation by checking that PackerCompile and PackerSync both work

[KJunya]

confirm version
nvim--version (should be v0.5+)

Had the same issue with Debian 10. I installed by apt install neovim which installed version 0.3.
I downloaded the compiled tar.gz of v0.5.1 and it worked. (the latest, at the time being, v0.7.2 did not run as it required higher gcc library or something).

[nat-418]

You are not going to successfully run such old Neovim versions with popular plugins. You should consider using Flatpak or Nix to install more recent software on Debian oldstable.

[tim-hilt]

@wjyoumans so you didn't find a solution yet? I just tried to open nvim and encountered the same issue. Didn't find a solution yet.

[mykytak]

Had same issue, solution was to restart nvim

[J-Kappes]

Same issue with NVIM v0.7.2.
I tried changing the vim.init line to lua require ('packer') in case it was a typo, and that actually lets nvim start without the error message :S

[nat-418]

@wjyoumans your Packer config is missing the use parameter in the initial startup callback.

Here is the correct code:

return require('packer').startup(function(use)
  -- Packer can manage itself
  use 'wbthomason/packer.nvim'
end)