Viewing Data in the Debugger
Note
This article applies to Visual Studio 2015. If you're looking for the latest Visual Studio documentation, see Visual Studio documentation. We recommend upgrading to the latest version of Visual Studio. Download it here
The Visual Studio debugger provides a variety of tools for inspecting and modifying the state of your program. Most of these tools function only in break mode.
DataTips
DataTips are one of the most convenient tools for viewing information about the variables and objects in your program during debugging. When the debugger is in break mode, you can view the value of a variable within the current scope by placing the mouse pointer over the variable in a source window. For more information, see View data values in Data Tips.
Visualizers
Visualizers are a new component of the Visual Studio debugger that enable you to view the contents of an object or variable in a meaningful way. For example, you can use the HTML visualizer to view an HTML string as it would be interpreted and displayed in a browser. You can access visualizers from DataTips, the Watch window, the Autos window, the Locals window, or the QuickWatch dialog box. For more information, see Create Custom Visualizers.