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Get started with C++ Build Insights

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The C++ Build Insights tools are available in Visual Studio 2019 and later. To see the documentation for that version, set the Visual Studio Version selector control for this article to Visual Studio 2019 or later. It's found at the top of the table of contents on this page.

C++ Build Insights is a collection of tools that provides increased visibility into the Microsoft Visual C++ (MSVC) tool chain. The tools collect data about your C++ builds, and present it in a format that can help you answer common questions, like:

  • Are my builds sufficiently parallelized?
  • What should I include in my pre-compiled header (PCH)?
  • Is there a specific bottleneck I should focus on to increase my build speeds?

The main components of this technology are:

  • vcperf.exe, a command-line utility that you can use to collect traces for your builds,
  • a Windows Performance Analyzer (WPA) extension that allows you to view build traces in WPA, and
  • the C++ Build Insights SDK, a software development kit for creating your own tools that consume C++ Build Insights data.

Documentation sections

Tutorial: vcperf and Windows Performance Analyzer
Learn how to collect build traces for your C++ projects and how to view them in WPA.

Tutorial: Windows Performance Basics
Discover useful WPA tips for analyzing your build traces.

C++ Build Insights SDK
An overview of the C++ Build Insights SDK.

Articles

Read these articles from the official C++ team blog for more information on C++ Build Insights:

Introducing C++ Build Insights

Analyze your builds programmatically with the C++ Build Insights SDK

Finding build bottlenecks with C++ Build Insights

Faster builds with PCH suggestions from C++ Build Insights

Profiling template metaprograms with C++ Build Insights

Improving code generation time with C++ Build Insights

Introducing vcperf /timetrace for C++ build time analysis

Faster C++ builds, simplified: a new metric for time