This question has two interpretations:

Check if the variable has a value
Check if the variable has a truthy value

The following answers both.

In JavaScript, a value could be nullish or not nullish, and a value could be falsy or truthy.
Nullish values are a proper subset of falsy values:

 ╭─ nullish ──────╮ ╭─ not nullish ─────────────────────────────────╮
┌───────────┬──────┬───────┬───┬────┬─────┬──────┬───┬─────────┬─────┐
│ undefined │ null │ false │ 0 │ "" │ ... │ true │ 1 │ "hello" │ ... │
└───────────┴──────┴───────┴───┴────┴─────┴──────┴───┴─────────┴─────┘
 ╰─ falsy ───────────────────────────────╯ ╰─ truthy ───────────────╯

Check if value is nullish (undefined or null)

Use one of the following depending on your coding style:

if (value == null)                         { /* value is nullish */ }
if (value === undefined || value === null) { /* value is nullish */ }
if (value == undefined)                    { /* value is nullish */ }
if ((value ?? null) === null)              { /* value is nullish */ }

Notes:

• The == operator works because it has a special case for null vs undefined comparison
• The === operator is more readable (opinion based), eqeqeq friendly and allows checking for undefined and null separately
• The first and third examples work identically, however the third one is rarely seen in production code
• The fourth example uses nullish coalescing operator to change nullish values to null for straight forward comparison

Check if value is not nullish

if (value != null)                         { /* value is not nullish, although it could be falsy */ }
if (value !== undefined && value !== null) { /* value is not nullish, although it could be falsy */ }
if (value != undefined)                    { /* value is not nullish, although it could be falsy */ }
if ((value ?? null) !== null)              { /* value is not nullish, although it could be falsy */ }

Check if value is falsy

Use the ! operator:

if (!value) { /* value is falsy */ }

Check if value is truthy

if (value) { /* value is truthy */ }

Data validation

The nullish, falsy and truthy checks cannot be used for data validation on their own. For example, 0 (falsy) is valid age of a person and -1 (truthy) is not. Additional logic needs to be added on case-by-case basis. Some examples:

/*
 * check if value is greater than/equal to 0
 * note that we cannot use truthy check here because 0 must be allowed
 */
[null, -1, 0, 1].forEach(num => {
  if (num != null && num >= 0) {
    console.log("%o is not nullish and greater than/equal to 0", num);
  } else {
    console.log("%o is bad", num);
  }
});

/*
 * check if value is not empty-or-whitespace string
 */
[null, "", " ", "hello"].forEach(str => {
  if (str && /\S/.test(str)) {
    console.log("%o is truthy and has non-whitespace characters", str);
  } else {
    console.log("%o is bad", str);
  }
});

/*
 * check if value is not an empty array
 * check for truthy before checking the length property
 */
[null, [], [1]].forEach(arr => {
  if (arr && arr.length) {
    console.log("%o is truthy and has one or more items", arr);
  } else {
    console.log("%o is bad", arr);
  }
});

/*
 * check if value is not an empty array
 * using optional chaining operator to make sure that the value is not nullish
 */
[null, [], [1]].forEach(arr => {
  if (arr?.length) {
    console.log("%o is not nullish and has one or more items", arr);
  } else {
    console.log("%o is bad", arr);
  }
});

The set of "truthy" and "falsey" values in JavaScript comes from the ToBoolean abstract operation defined in the ECMAScript spec, which is used when coercing a value to a boolean:

+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Argument Type | Result                                                   |
|---------------+----------------------------------------------------------|
| Undefined     | false                                                    |
|---------------+----------------------------------------------------------|
| Null          | false                                                    |
|---------------+----------------------------------------------------------|
| Boolean       | The result equals the input argument (no conversion).    |
|---------------+----------------------------------------------------------|
| Number        | The result is false if the argument is +0, −0, or NaN;   |
|               | otherwise the result is true.                            |
|---------------+----------------------------------------------------------|
| String        | The result is false if the argument is the empty String  |
|               | (its length is zero); otherwise the result is true.      |
|---------------+----------------------------------------------------------|
| Object        | true                                                     |
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+

From this table, we can see that null and undefined are both coerced to false in a boolean context. However, your fields.length === 0 does not map generally onto a false value. If fields.length is a string, then it will be treated as false (because a zero-length string is false), but if it is an object (including an array) it will coerce to true.

If fields should be a string, then !fields is a sufficient predicate. If fields is an array, your best check might be:

if (!fields || fields.length === 0)