check-cmake

A simple linter for CMake.

Installation

check-cmake requires Python 3.9 or higher.

pip3 install check-cmake

Usage

check-cmake is a command-line application

usage: check-cmake [-h] [-v] [--version] [--recurse | --no-recurse] [--limit LIMIT] [root]

CMake checker for C and C++ projects.

positional arguments:
  root                  path to the project root (default: .)

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -v, --verbose         enable verbose output
  --version             print the version and exit
  --recurse, --no-recurse
                        recurse into subfolders (default: True)
  --limit LIMIT         maximum errors to emit (default: 0)

v0.5.3 - github.com/marzer/check-cmake

Exit codes

Example output

error: /my_lib/CMakeLists.txt:29:9: language standard level should be set on a per-target basis using target_compile_features()
  Context:
    29 | set_target_properties(
    30 |     my_lib
    31 |     PROPERTIES
    32 |         CXX_STANDARD 14
    33 |         CXX_STANDARD_REQUIRED ON
    34 |         CXX_EXTENSIONS OFF
    35 | )
  Replace with:
    target_compile_features(): https://cmake.org/cmake/help/latest/command/target_compile_features.html
  More information:
    CMAKE_CXX_KNOWN_FEATURES: https://cmake.org/cmake/help/latest/prop_gbl/CMAKE_CXX_KNOWN_FEATURES.html
    CMAKE_C_KNOWN_FEATURES: https://cmake.org/cmake/help/latest/prop_gbl/CMAKE_C_KNOWN_FEATURES.html

found 1 error in 1 file.

Suppressing checks

Checks can be suppressed using comment-based 'pragmas' at the end of the source line:

set_target_properties(
    my_lib
    PROPERTIES
        CXX_STANDARD 14 # nocheck
        CXX_STANDARD_REQUIRED ON
        CXX_EXTENSIONS OFF
)

For compatibility with other tools, any of the following will also work:

# nolint

# check-cmake ignore
# lint-cmake ignore
# cmake-check ignore
# cmake-lint ignore

# check-cmake disable
# lint-cmake disable
# cmake-check disable
# cmake-lint disable

# check-cmake: ignore
# lint-cmake: ignore
# cmake-check: ignore
# cmake-lint: ignore

# check-cmake: disable
# lint-cmake: disable
# cmake-check: disable
# cmake-lint: disable

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md.

Changelog

v0.6.0 - 2026-10-15

• fixed --limit stopping only the current directory, so later directories still reported issues
• fixed output order varying with the file system's directory order
• fixed the Threads::Threads example printing a literal \n
• fixed the ExternalProject_Add() example printing ${{CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER}}
• fixed context snippets not highlighting an issue at the very end of the snippet
• fixed --help showing the --recurse default twice on older Python versions
• raised the minimum Python version to 3.9

v0.5.3 - 2025-08-07

• Fixed # nocheck not working in some rare circumstances

v0.5.2 - 2025-01-04

• Fixed internal Path.relative_to() error when used inside a virtual environment

v0.5.1 - 2024-10-15

• Fixed false positive for incorrect use of SYSTEM in target_include_directories() in some cases

v0.5.0 - 2024-03-25

• Added check for add_library() with implicit type (STATIC, SHARED, et cetera)

v0.4.0 - 2024-01-17

• Fixed line numbers sometimes being wrong in context snippets
• Added check for incorrectly-placed SYSTEM in target_include_directories()
• Added check for extraneous space in ExternalProject_Add() CMAKE_ARGS

v0.3.0 - 2024-01-13

• Fixed #nocheck

v0.2.0 - 2024-01-11

• Added pragmas for ignoring checks on a line
• Added check for cmake_minimum_required() when project() is present
• Fixed minor formatting issues

v0.1.0 - 2024-01-10

• First public release 🎉