llms.txt: machine-readable documentation index. Markdown version of this page is also available.

IntelliJ IDEA 2026.3 Help

Plugins

Plugins extend the core functionality of IntelliJ IDEA. For example, install plugins to integrate the IDE with version control systems, issue trackers, build management servers, get coding assistance support for various languages and frameworks, and more.

Most plugins can be used with any JetBrains product. Some are limited only to commercial products, others require a separate license.

If existing plugins do not provide some functionality that you need, you can create your own plugin for IntelliJ IDEA. For more information, refer to Develop your own plugins.

Install plugins

By default, IntelliJ IDEA includes bundled plugins that come with the IDE as part of its installation. You can install additional plugins from JetBrains Marketplace or from a local archive file (ZIP or JAR). These additional plugins are called non-bundled or downloaded plugins.

Install a plugin from Marketplace

  1. Open settings or press Ctrl+Alt+S in your IDE and then select Plugins.

  2. Type the name of the plugin you want to install in the search field.

    Click Show Marketplace results in the search field to see options sorting search results. Click Filter plugins to see the available filtering options.

  3. To install the plugin, click Install and restart the IDE if prompted.

    Installing a plugin on Plugins page in IDE settings

To install a specific version, go to the plugin page in JetBrains Marketplace, download and install it as described in Install plugin from disk. For example, you can do it if the most recent version of the plugin is broken.

Open plugin settings

  • Open settings or press Ctrl+Alt+S in your IDE and then select Plugins.

Here you can find several categories of plugins:

  • Installed: additional plugins that have been installed from JetBrains Marketplace, a custom plugin repository, or a local archive.

  • Bundled: plugins that are included with IntelliJ IDEA by default. You can enable or disable most of them, but you cannot uninstall them.

  • Suggested: plugins that IntelliJ IDEA recommends based on the technologies detected in the current project.

  • Marketplace: plugins that are available for installation from JetBrains Marketplace. These plugins appear as search results when you look for plugins.

  • Plugins that come from your custom repository if you use one.

Plugins settings showing plugins list; AI Agent Extension details on the right

If a plugin depends on some other plugin, you can find a list of the dependencies in the Additional Info tab. If your project depends on certain plugins, add them to the list of required plugins.

Install plugin from disk

You can install a plugin from disk if you need a specific plugin version that you have downloaded from JetBrains Marketplace or a plugin provided by a third party. In this case, you install the plugin from a local ZIP or JAR archive.

  1. Download the plugin archive (ZIP or JAR).

  2. Open settings or press Ctrl+Alt+S in your IDE and then select Plugins.

  3. On the Plugins page, click The Settings button Manage Repositories, Configure Proxy or Install Plugin from Disk and then click Install Plugin from Disk.

    The Plugins settings page with the settings menu open, showing the "Install Plugin from Disk" option.

  4. Select the plugin archive file and click OK.

  5. Click OK to apply the changes and restart the IDE if prompted.

Install plugin from command line

Install plugins from the command line when you want to automate IDE setup or install plugins without using the graphical interface.

  1. Quit the IDE on which you want to install the plugin.

  2. In JetBrains Marketplace, find a page of the plugin that you want to install, scroll down to the Additional Information section, and copy the value from the Plugin ID parameter, for example, org.jetbrains.plugins.github.

  3. Install the plugin:

    Navigate to the bin directory under your IntelliJ IDEA installation directory and run the following command:

    idea64.exe installPlugins <PluginID>

    For example:

    idea64.exe installPlugins org.jetbrains.plugins.github

    Run the following command:

    open -na "IntelliJ IDEA.app" --args installPlugins <PluginID>

    For example:

    open -na "IntelliJ IDEA.app" --args installPlugins org.jetbrains.plugins.github

    Navigate to the bin directory under your IntelliJ IDEA installation directory and run the following command:

    idea.sh installPlugins <PluginID>

    For example:

    idea.sh installPlugins org.jetbrains.plugins.github

For more information, refer to Install plugins from the command line.

Update plugins

Update plugins manually

Plugin updates are available for plugins with a configured update source.

  1. Open settings or press Ctrl+Alt+S in your IDE and then select Plugins.

  2. If a new version of an installed plugin is available, the Update button appears in the plugin settings. Click it to update the plugin.

    Plugins settings with Kafka plugin selected; Update button visible for the newer available version.

To configure whether your IDE should check for updates, open Settings Ctrl+Alt+S and go to Appearance & Behavior | System Settings | Updates. On this page, you can also click Check for Updates to manually check your plugin repository for available plugin updates.

If you prefer the IDE to update all plugins automatically, you can configure it accordingly.

For more information about the IDE and plugin updates, refer to Update IntelliJ IDEA.

Update plugins automatically

By default, IntelliJ IDEA notifies you to manually update a plugin when a new version of the plugin becomes available. You can configure IntelliJ IDEA to automatically download plugin updates and apply them on the next IDE restart.

Automatic plugin updates are available for plugins with a configured update source. In this case, IntelliJ IDEA checks for updates in the specified repository and does not automatically install updates from other repositories.

  1. Open settings or press Ctrl+Alt+S in your IDE and then select Plugins.

  2. Click The Settings button Manage Repositories, Configure Proxy or Install Plugin from Disk and select Update Plugins Automatically.

    Settings dialog, Plugins page, gear icon menu open with Update Plugins Automatically option checked and highlighted.

    Alternatively, go to Appearance & Behavior | System Settings | Updates and select Update plugins automatically.

Plugin update sources

IntelliJ IDEA updates plugins only if their source is known. When you install a plugin from JetBrains Marketplace or a custom plugin repository, IntelliJ IDEA records that repository as the plugin source.

If a plugin does not have an update source configured, IntelliJ IDEA does not automatically update it or notify you when updates are available. This can happen, for example, when you install a plugin from disk or when the IDE cannot determine the source of a previously installed plugin.

If IntelliJ IDEA stops updating a plugin, you will see a notification with a link to set the source. Otherwise, you can check the source in settings.

Check or change a plugin update source

  1. Open settings or press Ctrl+Alt+S in your IDE and then select Plugins.

  2. Select the installed plugin and open the Additional Info tab.

  3. Find the Updates from field to view or change the plugin update source.

    Select a repository that you trust and from which you want to receive updates for the plugin.

Deactivate plugins

Disable plugins

You can disable a plugin without removing it if you do not need the corresponding functionality, but you do not want to uninstall the plugin from your IDE.

  1. Open settings or press Ctrl+Alt+S in your IDE and then select Plugins.

  2. Find and select the plugin that you want to disable.

  3. On the plugin's description pane, click Disable.

    Alternatively, you can use the toggle buttons in the list of plugins or the Disable all buttons for plugin categories.

You can disable or enable all non-bundled plugins at once in the menu under The Settings button Manage Repositories, Configure Proxy or Install Plugin from Disk.

Disable all downloaded plugins

Uninstall plugins

  1. Open settings or press Ctrl+Alt+S in your IDE and then select Plugins.

  2. Find and select the plugin that you want to uninstall.

  3. Expand the Disable list and select Uninstall.

    Uninstalling a plugin in IDE settings

Required plugins

A project may require plugins that provide support for certain technologies or frameworks. You can add such plugins to the list of required plugins for the current project, so that IntelliJ IDEA will verify that the plugins are installed and enabled. It will notify you if you forget about some plugin, or someone on your team is not aware about the dependency as they work on the project.

Add a required plugin for your current project

  1. Press Ctrl+Alt+S to open settings and then select Appearance & Behavior | Required Plugins.

  2. On the Required Plugins page, click The Add icon Add and select the plugin. Optionally, specify the minimum and maximum version of the plugin.

The list of required plugins is stored in the .idea/externalDependencies.xml file of your project. When you open the project in IntelliJ IDEA, it will notify you if the required plugin is disabled, not installed, or requires an update.

Click the link in the notification message to enable, install, or update the required plugin.

Suggested plugins

When you open a project, IntelliJ IDEA can suggest installing and enabling plugins based on libraries and facets used in your project. Do not confuse suggested plugins with required plugins that you can manually add to a project so that your teammates also use it.

If you do not need a particular plugin, you can prevent IntelliJ IDEA from suggesting it. You can also use your notification settings to disable or enable notifications of all plugin suggestions and the way they are displayed.

Disable suggestions of a plugin

  • When a notification of a suggested plugin appears, click Don't suggest again.

Next time when you open a project, IntelliJ IDEA will not suggest this plugin.

Check a project for suggested plugins

You can check your project for suggested plugins except for plugins for which you have disabled suggestions.

  1. Press Ctrl+Shift+A and start typing Check Suggested Plugins.

  2. Select the Check Suggested Plugins action.

    Go to Action popup showing Check Suggested Plugins action highlighted as the top result under the Actions tab.

  3. If IntelliJ IDEA has a plugin applicable to your project, you see a notification message. Click the link in the notification message to install or enable the suggested plugin.

Alternatively, you can open the IDE settings (Ctrl+Alt+S) and select Plugins: if there are plugins suggested for your project, they will be displayed in the Suggested section.

Plugins settings showing plugins list; AI Agent Extension details on the right

Develop your own plugins

You can use any edition of IntelliJ IDEA to develop plugins. It provides an open API, a dedicated SDK, module, and run/debug configurations to help you.

The recommended workflow is to use Gradle. The old workflow using the internal IntelliJ IDEA build system is also supported. For more information, refer to the IntelliJ Platform SDK Developer Guide.

Custom plugin repositories

By default, IntelliJ IDEA is configured to use plugins from JetBrains Marketplace. This is a public repository where everyone can host their plugins. However, if you develop plugins for internal use only, you can set up a custom plugin repository for them.

For more information about setting up a custom plugin repository, see the IntelliJ Platform SDK documentation.

Once you set up your plugin repository, add it to IntelliJ IDEA:

Add custom repositories

  1. Open settings or press Ctrl+Alt+S in your IDE and then select Plugins.

  2. On the Plugins page, click The Settings button Manage Repositories, Configure Proxy or Install Plugin from Disk.

  3. In the Custom Plugin Repositories dialog, click The Add icon Add and specify your repository URL.

    The URL needs to point to the location of the XML file that describes your plugin, for example, updatePlugins.xml. The file can be on the same server as your custom plugins, or on a dedicated one.

    How to add a custom plugin repository

  4. Click OK in the Custom Plugin Repositories dialog to save the list of plugin repositories.

  5. Click OK in the Settings dialog to apply the changes.

When you search for plugins, IntelliJ IDEA will show you results both from default JetBrains Marketplace and any custom repositories that you specify. To browse only a certain custom plugin repository, click Filter plugins Filter plugins, select Repository, and then select this repository from the list.

Alternatively, you can add your custom plugin repositories using the idea.plugin.hosts property:

  1. Go to Help | Edit Custom Properties….

  2. Add the idea.plugin.hosts property to the platform properties file and specify the URL of the XML file that describes your plugin. For example:

    idea.plugin.hosts="http://plugins.example.com:8080/updatePlugins.xml"

  3. Restart IntelliJ IDEA.

You may want to replace default JetBrains Marketplace with your custom plugin repository. This can be helpful if you want only your custom repository plugins to be available from IntelliJ IDEA.

Replace the default plugin repository

  1. Go to Help | Edit Custom Properties….

  2. Add the idea.plugins.host property to the platform properties file and specify the URL of the application that can properly handle requests from IntelliJ IDEA, that is, act as the default plugin repository application instead of JetBrains Marketplace.

    In particular, it should handle the following requests:

  3. Restart IntelliJ IDEA.

If you replace the default plugin repository, the search field of the Plugins dialog will browse only the plugins in the new default repository and any custom repositories that you add.

Configure plugin update sources manually

Organizations can install or update plugins directly in the IDE plugin directory. Since this bypasses the standard installation process, IntelliJ IDEA may not know where to check for updates. Users may see warnings about missing update sources, and these plugins will not update automatically.

Administrators can configure plugin update sources by editing the pluginUpdateSources.xml file.

  1. Locate and open the IntelliJ IDEA configuration directory.

  2. Open the options folder.

  3. Open or create the pluginUpdateSources.xml file.

  4. Add an entry for each plugin whose update source you want to configure.

    <application> <component name="PluginUpdateSources"> <sources> <entry pluginId="pluginId"> <!-- for a custom repository --> <!-- custom repository url is exactly the url of custom repository with trimmed `/` on the end, as it is configured in IDE --> <updateSource host="<custom repository url>" isMarketplace="false" /> </entry> <!-- Plugin2 would be updated from the Marketplace or Marketplace proxy for users of ToolBox Enterprise --> <entry pluginId="pluginId2"> <updateSource /> </entry> <entry pluginId="pluginId3"> <updateSource .../> </entry> ... </sources> </component> </application>

Productivity tips

Some websites that integrate with the IDE, documentation pages, and tutorials might include links that open your IDE and prompt you to install a plugin. When you click an installation link:

  1. Your IDE opens.

  2. The IDE checks whether the requested plugin is available.

  3. If the plugin is compatible, you are prompted to install or enable it.

  4. After installation, the plugin is ready to use. If a restart is required, the IDE will prompt you.

    If multiple plugins are included in the link, you can install them in a single operation.

For example, you can use this link to install the Mercurial plugin.

02 November 2026
Background imagePath variables