tsc is not recognized as internal or external command

The problem is that tsc is not in your PATH if installed locally.

You should modify your .vscode/tasks.json to include full path to tsc.

The line to change is probably equal to "command": "tsc".

You should change it to "command": "node" and add the following to your args: "args": ["${workspaceRoot}\\node_modules\\typescript\\bin\\tsc"] (on Windows).

This will instruct VSCode to:

1. Run NodeJS (it should be installed globally).
2. Pass your local Typescript installation as the script to run.

(that's pretty much what tsc executable does)

Are you sure you don't want to install Typescript globally? It should make things easier, especially if you're just starting to use it.

You need to run:

npx tsc

...rather than just calling tsc own its on like a Windows command as everyone else seems to be suggesting.

If you don't have npx installed then you should. It should be installed globally (unlike Typescript). So first run:

npm install -g npx

..then run npx tsc.

There might be a reason that Typescript is not installed globally, so install it

npm install -g typescript // installs typescript globally

If you want to convert .ts files into .js, do this as per your need

tsc path/file.ts // file.ts will be converted to file.js
tsc              // all .ts files will be converted to .js files with in the directory
tsc --watch      // converts all .ts files to .js, and watch changes in .ts files