Microsoft Releases the .NET MAUI Extension for Visual Studio Code

Microsoft announced today that its .NET MAUI extension for Visual Studio Code is generally available, almost one year after the first preview release.

“The .NET MAUI extension brings the tools you need to develop .NET MAUI apps into the lightweight Visual Studio Code experience,” Microsoft’s Maddie Montaquila writes. “It’s built on top of C# Dev Kit and the C# extension, which bring in a Solution Explorer, C# Hot Reload, powerful C# IntelliSense, and much more. The .NET MAUI extension adds the ability to target mobile and desktop devices, plus – with the latest releases of the extensions – XAML IntelliSense and XAML Hot Reload, while keeping your VS Code experience streamlined and simple.”

.NET MAUI is Microsoft’s cross-platform mobile app framework–developers use it to create apps with one code base that run across Android, iPhone, iPad, Windows, and Mac–and it’s typically accessed in a workload in the full Visual Studio product. But with this extension, developers can now use the lighter Visual Studio Code environment instead.

Since the preview, Microsoft has added experimental support for Hot Reload, which lets developers edit an app’s C# or XAML source code while it’s running and watch the changes happen in the live running app. There’s also a much improved XAML editing experience based on the XAML Language Service in full Visual Studio that’s compatible with GitHub Copilot and provides autocomplete, tooltips, and code navigation functionality.

Now that the .NET MAUI extension is generally available, Microsoft will improve performance and reliability, and add new features, on a monthly basis.

You can learn more on Microsoft Learn, or just install the extension via the Visual Studio Marketplace.