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MSBuild

MSBuild is Microsoft's build platform, the engine that actually compiles .NET and Visual Studio projects. It ties for #26 in usage among developer tools at roughly 11% share. Every time you hit "Build" in Visual Studio, or run dotnet build from the command line, MSBuild is what's running underneath — parsing project files and orchestrating the compile, restore, and packaging steps.

Quick facts
Type: Build automation platform (.NET/Visual Studio)
Made by: Microsoft
License: Free / open-source (MIT, part of .NET SDK)
Platforms/Hosting: Windows, macOS, Linux (via the .NET SDK)
Primary use case: Compiling, restoring, and packaging .NET projects and solutions
Jump to: ExampleGetting startedBest for

Example

Every .NET project file (.csproj) is itself an MSBuild XML document — you can set build properties directly inside it.

<!-- a real .csproj snippet with an MSBuild property -->
<Project Sdk="Microsoft.NET.Sdk">
  <PropertyGroup>
    <TargetFramework>net8.0</TargetFramework>
    <Nullable>enable</Nullable>
    <OutputType>Exe</OutputType>
  </PropertyGroup>
</Project>

# build the project via the dotnet CLI (invokes MSBuild)
dotnet build --configuration Release

Getting started

MSBuild ships bundled with the .NET SDK and with Visual Studio — installing either gives you a working msbuild/dotnet command.

# install the .NET SDK (includes MSBuild)
winget install Microsoft.DotNet.SDK.8

# verify and build a project directly
dotnet --version
msbuild MyApp.csproj /p:Configuration=Release
Best for: Any team building .NET applications — from ASP.NET Core web APIs to WPF desktop apps — since MSBuild is the required, non-optional engine underneath Visual Studio and the dotnet CLI.