Web development on Windows

  • 5 minutes to read

Microsoft offers a variety of resources for web developers, including new tools and features supporting web development using Windows. This guide covers many of the tools available and provides a place to leave feedback toward making Windows your ideal environment to develop on for the web. For a list of APIs, see APIs for web development. For more help with getting started, see Set up your development environment on Windows.

Microsoft Edge DevTools icon
Microsoft Edge DevTools
Microsoft Edge Developer Tools are a set of inspection and debugging tools built directly into the Microsoft Edge browser. To open DevTools, with Microsoft Edge in focus:

  • Right-click then Inspect
  • Select the F12 key
  • Ctrl + Shift + i

PWA icon
Progressive Web Apps on Windows
Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) provide your users with a native, app-like experience customized for their devices. They are websites that are progressively enhanced to function like native apps on supporting platforms.
Get started with PWAs

Microsoft Edge browser

Debugging, Testing and Accessibility

WebDriver icon
WebDriver
Close the loop on your developer cycle by automating testing of your website in Microsoft Edge with Microsoft WebDriver.
Install WebDriver

Visual Studio code editors

VS Code icon
VS Code
A lightweight source code editor with built-in support for JavaScript, TypeScript, Node.js, a rich ecosystem of extensions (C++, C#, Java, Python, PHP, Go) and runtimes (such as .NET and Unity).
Install VS Code

Visual Studio icon
Visual Studio (IDE)
An integrated development environment that you can use to edit, debug, build code, and publish apps, including compilers, intellisense code completion, and many more features.
Install Visual Studio

WSL, Terminal, Package Manager, Docker Desktop

ASP.NET, Typescript, Xamarin

ASP.NET icon
ASP.NET
A cross-platform framework for building web apps and services, Internet of Things (IoT) apps, or mobile backends with .NET and C#. Use your favorite dev tools on Windows, macOS, and Linux. Deploy to the cloud or on-premises. Run on .NET Core.
Install ASP.NET

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Typescript
TypeScript extends JavaScript by adding types to the language. For example, JavaScript provides language primitives like string, number, and object, but it doesn't check that you've consistently assigned these. TypeScript does.
Try in your browser Install locally

Xamarin repo icon
Xamarin
Xamarin lets you build native apps for Android, iOS, and macOS using .NET code and platform-specific user interfaces. Xamarin.Forms allows you to build native apps, with shared UI code written in C# or XAML.
Install Xamarin

Open Source contributions

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Open Source at Microsoft
Thousands of Microsoft engineers use, contribute to and release open source every day. Popular projects include Visual Studio Code, TypeScript, .NET, and ChakraCore.
Get involved

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Contribute to the docs
Most of the documentation sets at Microsoft are open source and hosted on GitHub. Contribute by filing issues or authoring pull requests.
Learn how

Cloud development with Azure

Azure icon
Azure
A complete cloud platform to host your existing apps and streamline new development. Azure services integrate everything you need to develop, test, deploy, and manage your apps.
Set up an Azure account

Azure dev guide icon
Learn Azure
A complete cloud platform to host your existing apps and streamline new development. Azure services integrate everything you need to develop, test, deploy, and manage your apps.
Set up an Azure account

Addtional resources

Transitioning between Mac and Windows

Check out our guide to transitioning between between a Mac and Windows (or Windows Subsystem for Linux) development environment.

  • Keyboard shortcuts
  • Trackpad shortcuts
  • Terminal and shell tools
  • Apps and utilities