Regression: incorrect return type when disabled strictNullChecks

🔎 Search Terms

"ts7011", "strictnullchecks"

🕗 Version & Regression Information

• This changed between versions 5.6.3 and 5.7.0-beta (also in 5.7.0-dev.20241010)

When disabled strictNullChecks in tsconfig.json error TS7011: Function expression, which lacks return-type annotation, implicitly has an T return type

⏯ Playground Link

https://www.typescriptlang.org/play/?strict=false&strictNullChecks=false&alwaysStrict=false&noEmitHelpers=true&noUnusedLocals=true&esModuleInterop=false&declaration=false&importHelpers=true&experimentalDecorators=true&target=6&module=6&suppressImplicitAnyIndexErrors=true&strictBuiltinIteratorReturn=true&ts=5.7.0-dev.20241010#code/CYUwxgNghgTiAEAzArgOzAFwJYHtXwHcsJgxZgAVHAJRAHMBRADwAcAKAZwC54OMYsqOgEoetRq3gAfeKmQQIAbgBQYPH3gx5IDvAC88ANoByKMYA08YwCNjAXQB0iaBgCyUdlogI9APkLEpORU4sye2sLSMoZ2wopAA

💻 Code

declare function wildcardToRegExp(s: string): RegExp | null;
const rules = ['a', 'b'].flatMap(rule => wildcardToRegExp(rule) || []); // if flatMap<RegExp> - no error

🙁 Actual behavior

TS7011: Function expression, which lacks return-type annotation, implicitly has an 'RegExp | any[]' return type.

🙂 Expected behavior

No error

Additional information about the issue

No response

Start by reproducing the linked Playground case with TypeScript 5.7 and the shown tsconfig settings, then compare it with 5.6.3. The change is complete when the flatMap callback no longer produces TS7011 with strictNullChecks disabled while the reported behavior remains correct.