__vitest_browser_runner__.runTests is not a function when browser mode x customzied root

[Jinjiang]

Describe the bug

when the root is specified to an outside dir x browser mode
https://github.com/Jinjiang/reproductions/tree/vitest-browser-20250408

(not sure whether it's same to #6674)

Reproduction

https://github.com/Jinjiang/reproductions/tree/vitest-browser-20250408

cd tool
pnpm install

# it works
pnpm test
# it works
pnpm test2
# it doesn't work
pnpm test3

error:

Vitest caught 1 unhandled error during the test run.
This might cause false positive tests. Resolve unhandled errors to make sure your tests are not affected.

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TypeError: __vitest_browser_runner__.runTests is not a function
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System Info

System:
    OS: macOS 15.5
    CPU: (8) arm64 Apple M1
    Memory: 98.09 MB / 8.00 GB
    Shell: 5.9 - /bin/zsh
  Binaries:
    Node: 22.14.0 - ~/.local/share/mise/installs/node/22/bin/node
    Yarn: 1.22.18 - ~/.yarn/bin/yarn
    npm: 10.9.2 - ~/.local/share/mise/installs/node/22/bin/npm
    pnpm: 10.7.1 - ~/Library/pnpm/pnpm
    bun: 1.1.36 - ~/.local/share/mise/installs/bun/latest/bin/bun
  Browsers:
    Safari: 18.5
  npmPackages:
    @vitest/browser: ^3.1.1 => 3.1.1 
    playwright: ^1.51.1 => 1.51.1 
    vitest: ^3.1.1 => 3.1.1

Used Package Manager

pnpm

Validations

• Follow our Code of Conduct
• Read the Contributing Guidelines.
• Read the docs.
• Check that there isn't already an issue that reports the same bug to avoid creating a duplicate.
• Check that this is a concrete bug. For Q&A open a GitHub Discussion or join our Discord Chat Server.
• The provided reproduction is a minimal reproducible example of the bug.

[hi-ogawa]

Can you provide something more realistic? For example, should proejct/package.json and tool/package.json both have same vitest at least and managed by pnpm (so it points to the same node_modules/.pnpm/vitest...)?

[Jinjiang]

Sure. In realistic, the vitest was called in a tool in node_modules. So basically vitest is a deep dependency. And the project itself could have no direct vitest dep or another vitest instance.

<real-project>
  src
    foo.spec.ts
  node_modules
    the-tool
      node_modules
        vitest

And it works always without browser mode. as the pnpm test2 shows.

[hi-ogawa]

Okay, I misunderstood the assumption then. In that case, I think users cannot have auto-completion of import "vitest", but is that expected? or does it somehow work fine with global typing?

[Jinjiang]

I see. In this aspect, there could be another vitest instance in <project-root>/node_modules. I understand this is just for type checking?

Anyway, I've updated the reproduction this time there is a vitest instance in project and no test.globals in the vitest config. Still, pnpm test and pnpm test2 work and pnpm test3 doesn't.

[hi-ogawa]

Ah sorry, my question about auto-completion was just a side question to understand your use case better overall. (And not about judging intended Vitest behaivor per-se.)