Bump default `build.target`

[sapphi-red]

Description

The current default build.target is a bit outdated.

es2020
edge88
firefox78
chrome87
safari14

The reasons why this should be bumped:

• this support range requires optional chaining to be transpiled causing the bundle size to be bigger
  • AFAIK we didn't want to transpile optional chaining
  • caniuse shows that Chrome 80+, Edge 80+, Firefox 74+, Safari 13.1+ supports it, but esbuild transpiles it unless the target is Chrome 91+ due to Chrome's bug ("spread parameters after optional chaining" works in Chrome 91 compat-table/compat-table#1737)
  • (this is the reason I noticed)
• this support range requires logical assignments to be transpiled
  • esbuild transpiles it unless target is ES2021+, Chrome 85+, Firefox 79+, Safari 14+.
  • it is not common to write this operator by hand, but it's useful for minifiers

Suggested solution

I propose bumping the target to:

es2021
edge91
firefox79
chrome91
safari14

this allows optional chaining and logical assignments to be kept as-is.
Maybe it can be bumped further more, but I think we should bump to this range at least.

I also propose renaming the special 'modules' target to 'defaults' as it has been used as a default / recommended rather than the modules target (chrome60,firefox60,safari11).

Alternative

No response

Additional context

No response

Validations

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[sapphi-red]

In the last meeting, we concluded that it would be nice to align with Baseline.

For each major version, Vite will update the default build.target to the browser list used to generate "Baseline Widely available" (the browsers released at least 2.5 years ago).
For example, if Vite 7 were released in May 2025, the default build.target will be:

• Safari 15.6
• Chrome 104
• Edge 104
• Firefox 104

[nulladdict]

I feel like aligning with baseline is a great move

But please don't rename 'modules' target to 'defaults', because 'defaults' has a pretty strong meaning in the browserslist ecosystem which would add to the confusion around browserslist support

[sapphi-red]

please don't rename 'modules' target to 'defaults', because 'defaults' has a pretty strong meaning in the browserslist ecosystem

Ah, that's a good point. I think 'widely-available' or something that indicates that it aligns with the "Baseline Widely available" would be good.

[patak-dev]

Maybe it could be called 'baseline'?

[Tamas-hi]

I also think this is a good idea.

I'd just combine the last two suggestions - baseline-widely-available helps me instantly understand the exact target.
It's specific enough without being too verbose.