Require pairedItem on INodeExecutionData objects in execute() methods to preserve item linking (@n8n/community-nodes/missing-paired-item)

💼 This rule is enabled in the following configs: ✅ recommended, ☑️ recommendedWithoutN8nCloudSupport.

Rule Details

Every INodeExecutionData object returned from execute() should include a pairedItem property. Without it, downstream nodes cannot trace data lineage and expressions like $('NodeName').item will silently fail.

The rule detects object literals with a json property but no pairedItem inside execute() methods of INodeType classes.

Examples

Incorrect

class MyNode implements INodeType {
  async execute() {
    const items = this.getInputData();
    // Missing pairedItem
    return [items.map((item) => ({ json: item.json }))];
  }
}

class MyNode implements INodeType {
  async execute() {
    const returnData: INodeExecutionData[] = [];
    // Missing pairedItem
    returnData.push({ json: { result: true } });
    return [returnData];
  }
}

Correct

class MyNode implements INodeType {
  async execute() {
    const items = this.getInputData();
    return [items.map((item, index) => ({ json: item.json, pairedItem: { item: index } }))];
  }
}

class MyNode implements INodeType {
  async execute() {
    const returnData: INodeExecutionData[] = [];
    returnData.push({ json: { result: true }, pairedItem: { item: 0 } });
    return [returnData];
  }
}

When to Disable

If your node intentionally does not support item linking (e.g. it aggregates all input items into a single output), you can suppress this rule:

// eslint-disable-next-line @n8n/community-nodes/missing-paired-item
returnData.push({ json: aggregatedResult });

Further Reading

• n8n Paired Items Documentation