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Building pre-release packages

  • Artikel

Whenever you release an updated package with a new version number, NuGet considers that one as the "latest stable release" as shown, for example in the Package Manager UI within Visual Studio:

Package Manager UI showing the latest stable release

A stable release is one that's considered reliable enough to be used in production. The latest stable release is also the one that will be installed as a package update or during package restore (subject to constraints as described in Reinstalling and updating packages).

To support the software release lifecycle, NuGet 1.6 and later allows for the distribution of pre-release packages, where the version number includes a semantic versioning suffix such as -alpha, -beta, or -rc. For more information, see Package versioning.

You can specify such versions using one of the following ways:

  • If your project uses PackageReference: include the semantic version suffix in the .csproj file's PackageVersion element:

    <PropertyGroup>
    <PackageVersion>1.0.1-alpha</PackageVersion>
</PropertyGroup>

  • If your project has a packages.config file: include the semantic version suffix in the .nuspec file's version element:

    <version>1.0.1-alpha</version>

When you're ready to release a stable version, just remove the suffix and the package takes precedence over any pre-release versions. Again, see Package versioning.

Installing and updating pre-release packages

By default, NuGet does not include pre-release versions when working with packages, but you can change this behavior as follows:

  • Package Manager UI in Visual Studio: In the Manage NuGet Packages UI, check the Include prerelease box:

    The Include prerelease checkbox in Visual Studio

    Setting or clearing this box will refresh the Package Manager UI and the list of available versions you can install.

  • Package Manager Console: Use the -IncludePrerelease switch with the Find-Package, Get-Package, Install-Package, Sync-Package, and Update-Package commands. Refer to the PowerShell Reference.

  • NuGet CLI: Use the -prerelease switch with the install, update, delete, and mirror commands. Refer to the NuGet CLI reference

Semantic versioning

The Semantic Versioning or SemVer convention describes how to utilize strings in version numbers to convey the meaning of the underlying code. Learn more about the package versioning basics.