Production stripping misses plugin factory imports, leaving unused Hotkeys font assets #562

TanStack Devtools version

• @tanstack/react-devtools: 0.10.14
• @tanstack/devtools-vite: 0.8.6
• @tanstack/devtools-bundler-core: 0.1.4
• @tanstack/react-hotkeys-devtools: 0.14.1
• Transitive @tanstack/devtools-ui: 0.7.2

Framework/Library version

React 19.3.1; TanStack Start 1.169.4; Vite 8.3.5 / Rolldown 1.2.7 through Vite+ 1.4.0; Node.js 26.13.0.

Describe the bug

The production transform removes <TanStackDevtools> but leaves a plugin factory's import when the factory is used directly in the plugins array:

import { TanStackDevtools } from '@tanstack/react-devtools';
import { hotkeysDevtoolsPlugin } from '@tanstack/react-hotkeys-devtools';

export const App = () => (
  <TanStackDevtools plugins={[hotkeysDevtoolsPlugin()]} />
);

hotkeysDevtoolsPlugin is used only inside the removed element, but its import survives. The equivalent inline { name: 'Hotkeys', render: <HotkeysDevtoolsPanel /> } form removes both the element and the plugin import.

This occurs with devtools() first in the Vite plugins array and the default production removal enabled.

Minimal reproduction

The following isolates the stripping bug without a browser, app configuration, or access to the downstream repository. The React imports are source text passed to the parser, so only the bundler-core package needs to be installed.

Run in an empty directory:

npm init -y
npm install --save-exact @tanstack/devtools-bundler-core@0.1.4

node --input-type=module <<'NODE'
import { removeDevtools } from '@tanstack/devtools-bundler-core';

const factory = `import { TanStackDevtools } from '@tanstack/react-devtools';
import { hotkeysDevtoolsPlugin } from '@tanstack/react-hotkeys-devtools';
export const App = () => <TanStackDevtools plugins={[hotkeysDevtoolsPlugin()]} />;`;

const panel = `import { TanStackDevtools } from '@tanstack/react-devtools';
import { HotkeysDevtoolsPanel } from '@tanstack/react-hotkeys-devtools';
export const App = () => <TanStackDevtools plugins={[{name: 'Hotkeys', render: <HotkeysDevtoolsPanel/>}]} />;`;

for (const [name, source] of Object.entries({ factory, panel })) {
  console.log(`${name}:\n${removeDevtools(source, 'App.tsx')?.code}`);
}
NODE

Actual output, reproduced against the installed package:

factory:
import { hotkeysDevtoolsPlugin } from '@tanstack/react-hotkeys-devtools';
export const App = () => null;

panel:
export const App = () => null;

Expected behavior

Both examples should produce export const App = () => null;, with no plugin import left behind. A factory import used elsewhere should of course be preserved.

Source investigation

In getPluginReferences, each array element is skipped unless it is an ObjectExpression:

if (!el || el.type !== 'ObjectExpression') continue

A direct hotkeysDevtoolsPlugin() entry is a CallExpression, so its identifier is never collected for the subsequent plugin-import cleanup. The logic handles calls inside an object's render property, but not calls directly inside the plugins array.

Associated production-build impact

Our production client build contains no retained devtools modules, but emits these unreferenced fonts from @tanstack/devtools-ui:

Neither filename is referenced by the generated client JS, CSS, HTML, or JSON. This increases emitted-output measurements; it is not evidence of an additional browser download.

The surviving static import appears to expose Vite's related unused-asset retention behavior (vitejs/vite#9073). The transform reproduction above establishes the import-cleanup gap independently of that bundler behavior.

Downstream tracking

Found while investigating mykiary/caniplay.today#293. That repository is private; the standalone reproduction above does not require access.

No upstream fix PR yet.

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