Most Popular And Useful Visual Studio Shortcut Keys

As a developer, we use IDE almost the whole day and write code. We write several codes and complete the requirements of the application or small module of it. Besides coding, we do several other activities which are also part of development. Apart from writing code, we spend time building code, debugging, editing, formatting, refactoring, adding files, folders, projects, etc. These activities associated with writing code are also time-consuming and some take huge time which ultimately affects the productivity of Developers.

If a developer saves a small fraction of time in each of these activities, then it can improve productivity significantly. Using shortcut keys and commands can help to save time and result in considerable improvement as well as productivity.

In this article, I will share the most useful and trendy shortcut keys for visual studio which apply globally if it is not specified or altered. These shortcut keys are available for general or every profile for visual studio installed.

We can categorize these shortcut keys based on activities like to build, debug, Code Editor, File, Project, refactor, tools, and so on.

This article will discuss the shortcut keys to Visual Studio on Windows.

Debugging

One of the most common and time-consuming activities during coding and development is debugging. Using the below shortcut keys can improve productivity and save huge time for developers.

Action/Task/Command	Shortcut Keys
Start Debugging	F5
Stop Debugging	Shift + F5
Restart Debugging	Ctrl + Shift + F5
Start without Debugging	Ctrl + F5
Break at Function	Ctrl + B
Break All	Ctrl + Alt + B
Toggle Breakpoint	F9
Run to Cursor	Ctrl + F10
Disable Breakpoint	Ctrl + F9
Delete All Break Points	Ctrl + Shift + F9
Step Over (during Debug)	F10
Step Into	F11
Step Out	Shift + F11
Run to Cursor	Ctrl + F10
Quick watch	Ctrl + Alt + Q or Shift + F9
Exceptions	Ctrl + Alt + E
Attach to process	Ctrl + Alt + P
Immediate window	Ctrl + Alt + I
Immediate window command mode	Type >
Immediate window – clear buffer	Type cls
Immediate window – print value	Type ? varname

Building

The below are the popular building shortcut keys.

Action/Task/Command	Shortcut Keys
Build Solution	Ctrl + Shift + B
Cancel	Ctrl + Break
Compile	Ctrl + F7
Run Code analysis on Solution	Alt + F11

Code Editor

This is another area where developers or programmers spend most of their time writing code. And using shortcut keys can improve productivity and speed up the writing code. Some of the most common shortcut keys are listed below.