C++ Team Blog
The latest in C++, Visual Studio, VS Code, and vcpkg from the MSFT C++ team
Latest posts
VS Code C++ Extension Updates: 4x Faster Colorization & 3.5x Faster Project Startup
In the latest releases of the C++ Extension in Visual Studio Code, we have focused on performance improvements and stability. A fast, responsive, and reliable development environment is essential for maintaining productivity, especially in large and complex C++ projects. These updates include many incremental optimizations that collectively speed up the time from opening a C++ project to writing code with the full suite of C++ features available at your fingertips. Experience these new features for yourself by updating to the newest version of the C++ Extension. Faster Project Startup and Time to Colorization ...
Boost Your CMake Development with Copilot Custom Instructions
Introduction Creating a new CMake project that uses unfamiliar libraries can be daunting and time-consuming. This blog post takes you along on my journey using Copilot to make this easier, and leveraging Custom Instructions to tailor Copilot responses. For a sneak peek, see the outcome of this journey in this repository. Background As C++ developers who use Copilot every day, we’ve experienced how it can improve our day-to-day productivity. Copilot really shines in scenarios like new codebases or unfamiliar topics, significantly reducing ramp-up. There are multiple ways to engage with it in Visual Studio, incl...
Sign Up for the free Pure Virtual C++ 2025 Conference
Every year we run Pure Virtual C++: a free one-day virtual conference for the whole C++ community. Next month we’re doing it again! Sign-up for free to get access to our five live sessions and a host of pre-conference content. The live event will start at April 30th 14:00 UTC. Videos will be available to stream for free on YouTube after the conference. The speakers and topics will be announced soon. Hope to see you there!
C++ Dynamic Debugging: Full Debuggability for Optimized Builds
Over the past 5 years, we’ve had many incredible opportunities to engage with game developers. From AAA studios to indie developers, the passion for slashing iteration times is significant. Amidst all the fantastic feedback we've received for Visual Studio, one sentiment has rung loud and clear: a desire to debug optimized C++ code without sacrificing performance. Although game developers have voiced this need the loudest, we know that solving this issue will benefit many other C++ workflows. While we've consistently rolled out many productivity and performance enhancements over the years, debugging optimized cod...
Optimizing Build Times with Build Insights: How Activision Cut Call of Duty’s Build Time by 50%
Slow build times are a major headache for developers, especially in large, complex C++ codebases like game engines. Every minute spent waiting on a build is time that could be used to refine features, resolve issues, or push development forward. Activision faced this challenge with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II, where prolonged build times were slowing down iteration and impeding workflows. By leveraging Build Insights, they identified key inefficiencies, optimized bottlenecks, and successfully reduced build times from 27:49 minutes to just 14:25 minutes—cutting them in half. Read more about their journey in ou...
Visual Studio at GDC 2025
Join us in-person at Game Developers Conference 2025 with an in-depth look at how Visual Studio and GitHub Copilot can streamline your iteration workflow. Don’t miss the unveiling of our biggest C++ debugger update yet. Session Title: Accelerating Your Inner Loop with Visual Studio and GitHub Copilot Session Info: March 19th, 2025, 12:30 PM-1:30 PM Pacific Time | GDC Industry Stage, Expo Floor, South Hall Abstract: Get ready to supercharge your development process with the newest features in Visual Studio! This year, we're thrilled to unveil our most powerful C++ debugger upgrade yet, designed to sla...
Announcing Guidelines Support Library v4.2.0
Version 4.2.0 of Microsoft's Guidelines Support Library brings performance improvements, safety features, modern compiler support.
What’s New in vcpkg (February 2025): Package installation performance, new tested triplet, and more
This blog post summarizes changes to the vcpkg package manager as part of the 2025.02.14 registry release, 2025-02-11, 2025-01-29, 2025-01-24, and 2025-01-20 tool releases, as well as changes to vcpkg documentation throughout February. This release includes significant performance improvements when installing packages, a new tested triplet (x64-windows-release), an overhaul of how vcpkg handles some downloads and console output, and bug fixes. In terms of documentation, there are improvements to our maintainer guide, registries articles, and versioning articles, among others. Some stats for this period: ...
std::generator: Standard Library Coroutine Support
is a C++23 feature that enables you to write concise, straightforward functions that generate sequences of values on-demand without manually managing state. It builds upon C++20’s coroutines, providing some standard library support for this powerful, but complex, language feature. As of Visual Studio 2022 version 17.13, we ship an implementation of in our standard library. This blog post will walk through an example of how to use the feature, compare it to implementing custom ranges, consider some of the design decisions made, and briefly look at the performance implications. Motivating Example Here’s a sh...