Strict mode, discriminated unions, branded types, utility types, avoiding any — TypeScript practices that scale to 500K+ line codebases
Why TypeScript at Scale Is Different
TypeScript in a 500-line side project is forgiving. TypeScript in a 500,000-line production codebase with 20 contributors is a different animal entirely. The type system that was supposed to catch bugs can instead become a source of confusion, maintenance burden, and false confidence if not used deliberately.
At The Beyond Horizon, we enforce strict TypeScript practices across all projects from day one. Here is what we have learned about keeping TypeScript productive at scale.
Enable Strict Mode — All of It
In your tsconfig.json, set “strict”: true. This enables:
strictNullChecks: Variables are not implicitly nullable. You must handle null and undefined explicitly.
noImplicitAny: Every variable must have a type — no silent any types from inference failures.
strictFunctionTypes: Function parameter types are checked contravariantly.
strictPropertyInitialization: Class properties must be initialized in the constructor.
If your existing codebase does not compile under strict mode, enable each flag incrementally and fix errors file by file. Do not leave strict mode off because it is “too many errors” — those errors are real bugs waiting to happen.
Discriminated Unions
Discriminated unions are TypeScript’s most powerful pattern for modeling state. Instead of optional fields and boolean flags, use a union of types with a literal discriminant:
Define a type like ApiResponse with a status field set to a literal string. When status is “loading”, no other fields exist. When status is “success”, a data field is present. When status is “error”, an error field is present. TypeScript narrows the type automatically when you check the status field in a switch or if statement.
This eliminates entire classes of bugs: accessing data before it is loaded, forgetting to handle the error case, or having impossible states like both data and error being present simultaneously.
Branded Types
TypeScript’s structural typing means that a UserId (string) and an OrderId (string) are interchangeable. This is a bug waiting to happen — passing a user ID where an order ID is expected compiles without error.
Branded types add a phantom property that makes structurally identical types incompatible. Declare a type UserId = string & { readonly __brand: “UserId” }. Create a factory function that casts a string to UserId after validation. Now TypeScript prevents you from mixing up ID types.
Utility Types
TypeScript’s built-in utility types eliminate boilerplate:
Partial: Makes all properties optional. Use for update operations where you only change some fields.
Required: Makes all properties required. Use for strict object creation.
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Pick: Extracts a subset of properties. Use for API responses that return only specific fields.
Omit: Removes specific properties. Use for creating types without sensitive fields like passwords.
Record: Creates an object type with keys of type K and values of type V. Use for lookup maps.
Extract and Exclude: Filter union types.
ReturnType: Extracts the return type of a function. Use to type variables that store function results without duplicating the type definition.
Avoiding any
The any type disables all type checking. It is a virus — one any in a function signature infects everything it touches.
Use unknown instead of any for values whose type you do not know. unknown requires type narrowing before use, forcing you to validate.
Use never for cases that should be unreachable. If TypeScript does not error on a never assignment, your logic has a gap.
Use generics when the type depends on the caller: function identity(value: T): T is better than function identity(value: any): any.
Banning any in CI
Add an ESLint rule to ban explicit any types: @typescript-eslint/no-explicit-any set to error. Run this in CI to prevent any from entering the codebase through pull requests.
Module Organization
For large codebases, organize types close to where they are used:
Co-locate types with code: Place type definitions in the same file or a neighboring types.ts file within the same feature directory.
Shared types in a types/ directory: Only types used across multiple features belong in a shared directory.
Barrel exports: Use index.ts files to create clean import paths, but be aware that barrel files can increase bundle size if tree-shaking is not effective.
Namespace with modules: Use TypeScript’s module system (import/export) rather than namespaces for code organization.
Declaration Files
When integrating with untyped JavaScript libraries, write declaration files (.d.ts) rather than using any:
Create a types/ directory for third-party type declarations
Use declare module to type modules without published types
Contribute your types back to DefinitelyTyped when possible
TypeScript is only as good as the discipline your team applies to it. Set strict standards early, enforce them in CI, and your codebase will remain maintainable as it grows. Need help scaling your TypeScript codebase? Contact us.
