ReSharper 8 vs. Visual Studio 2012

This document lists some of the features that are provided by ReSharper 8 but are missing or not as fully implemented in Visual Studio 2012.

You are viewing the comparison matrix for an earlier version of ReSharper. View this page in the latest version.
Microsoft Visual Studio 2012
8 Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 + ReSharper 8

Code Analysis

Design-time code analysis On-the-fly design-time code analysis
230 code analysis rules (code inspections) 1400+ code analysis rules (code inspections)
Design-time error highlighting: some compiler errors Design-time error highlighting: most compiler errors, many possible runtime errors (such as detection of possible null reference exceptions)
Adjustable code inspections: 3 severity levels. Need to go to project options to configure Adjustable code inspections: 5 severity levels. Can be configured right from the text editor
Sharing code analysis settings Sharing code analysis settings on a solution or team level
Smart tags to resolve compiler errors 700+ quick-fixes to resolve errors and code quality issues
Solution-wide error analysis
Reporting all errors and code quality issues in any scope, up to the entire solution
Naming style control
Custom code inspections with code annotations and structural search and replace patterns

Architecture tools

Project dependency graph (in Ultimate edition) Project dependency graph that doesn't require Visual Studio Ultimate Edition and displays without compiling solution

Refactoring

6 automated refactorings 49 automated refactorings
200+ context actions (automated code transformations)

Coding Assistance

Code completion Code completion is context-driven, can suggest types and extension methods from the entire solution, import namespaces, generate code
Auto-import namespace import directives Auto-import namespace import directives
Completing entire code statements
Rearranging logical blocks of code
Localization assistance
Spell checking: available via ReSpeller plugin

Navigation & Search

Go to declaration Go to declaration
Find references Find references
Highlight references Highlight references
Go to symbol Go to symbol
Go to type Go to everything / type
Go to file member Go to file member
Go to file Go to file
Code bookmarks Code bookmarks
Navigation up and down inheritance hierarchy in the editor
Indication of type inheritors and method overrides
Structural search and replace
Go to base type
Go to inheritor
Go to related files
Navigate external sources
Navigate to decompiled code
View recent files
View recent edits
Type hierarchy view
Project hierarchy view
Members hierarchy view
CSS style hierarchy view
File structure
Solution-wide to-do browser
Stack trace explorer

Code Generation

Create from usage Create from usage
Code snippets (templates) Code snippets (templates)
Generate files from template Generate files from template
Generate multiple files from template
Visual editor for code snippets (templates)
Generate type members
Generate properties
Generate constructors

Code Cleanup

Reformat code Reformat code
Optimize namespace import directives Optimize namespace import directives
Remove code redundancies
Organize type members
Code Cleanup: performs all cleanup tasks in one go

Unit Testing

Unit test explorer Unit test explorer
MSTest support MSTest support
NUnit support
QUnit support
Jasmine support
xUnit.net support: available via xUnit.net Contrib project plugin
MSpec support: available via MSpec Test Runner plugin
Multiple unit test sessions
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