As a developer, having the right tools can make a huge difference in your coding workflow. Visual Studio Code (VSCode) is a popular code editor that is highly customizable with its extensions. You can tailor your editor experience to your specific needs and preferences with the right extensions. In this blog post, we’ve compiled a list of the 15 best VSCode extensions for writing better code and staying ahead of the game. Whether you’re a beginner or a seasoned developer, these extensions can help you improve your productivity, reduce errors, and write cleaner, more efficient code. So, let’s dive in and explore these essential VSCode extensions.
1. Gitlens
GitLens is a powerful and best VSCode Git extension that adds functionality to VSCode’s built-in Git support. It allows you to view detailed Git blame annotations, visualize code changes over time, and more.
Gitlens provides an intuitive and user-friendly interface to explore your Git repositories, allowing you to easily view the history, compare branches, and review changesets. With GitLens, you can quickly search through all your commits, identify when and where changes were made, and even review code side-by-side with others. You can also assign blame to particular lines of code, see commit messages, track pull requests, and check out the most recent changes in your code.
2. ESLint
ESLint is a powerful JavaScript linter that helps you identify and fix errors in your code. This plugin integrates ESLint with VSCode, allowing you to see errors and warnings directly within the editor.
With ESLint, you can quickly identify and fix problems before they become major issues. This plugin helps keep your code clean, efficient, and free of errors. With the help of this extension, you can ensure that your project is of the highest quality and meets the coding standards set by your organization. Additionally, it can be used to create custom rules to help enforce best coding practices. ESLint is definitely one of the best extensions for VSCode if you’re looking to improve the quality of your projects.
3. Jest
Jest is one of the best VSCode extensions available, especially for those who are developing with JavaScript. It’s a testing framework that makes it easy to write, run, and debug tests for any JavaScript project. With Jest, you can test different parts of your application separately from each other, and quickly identify bugs or problems. This helps you ensure that your code is working as expected, and you can make changes if needed. Further, Jest has features such as snapshot testing and code coverage reports, which make testing more efficient. It’s one of the best extensions for VSCode, and definitely worth checking out.
4. Prettier
Another best VSCode extension is Prettier which helps you to format your code automatically. It allows you to ensure that your code is formatted correctly without having to manually adjust the spacing, indentation, and other details of your codebase.
It supports languages such as JavaScript, HTML, CSS, and more and offers a wide range of configuration options for customizing the way your code is formatted. With Prettier, you can keep your codebase consistent, uniform, and easy to read.
5. Import Cost
Image Credit: Visual Studio
This extension is designed to help developers keep track of the cost of their import statements and quickly find potential areas where they can optimize their code by reducing unnecessary imports. This plugin provides an inline display of the imported package size in the editor, so developers can easily identify large imports that might be causing performance issues.
Import Code extension also provides a detailed report view to review all imported packages, sizes, and impact on the bundle size. With Import cost, developers can make sure their code remains as efficient as possible and get the best performance from their applications.
6. Live Server
Live Server extension enables developers to preview their projects in a browser as they work on them. With this extension, you can quickly check how your HTML, CSS, and JavaScript code will look in the browser and make necessary adjustments while coding.
Live Server also supports hot-reload when any file changes are detected in the workspace. It is a must-have extension for all developers who want to stay productive and work faster.
7. Project Manager
Project Manager is one of the best VSCode extensions which helps you to organize your project’s files, folders, and even related projects. It offers an intuitive user interface that allows you to open and switch between projects quickly and save the change you’ve made
You can also use it to create workspaces so you can have multiple projects open at once. Additionally, you can set custom shortcuts, apply themes and manage your extensions within this plugin. With this extension, you’ll be able to work more efficiently and get more work done in less time.
8. Partial Diff
Partial Diff enables you to compare and modify code quickly. This extension allows developers to compare changes between two files or parts of a file and apply the changes to either file in a few simple clicks.
Partial Diff also offers syntax highlighting for differences, which makes it much easier to spot mistakes in your code. This plugin helps developers to save time, as they can quickly identify and fix errors without having to spend too much time on manual comparisons. It is an essential tool for any developer looking to optimize their workflow and improve the quality of their code.
9. Image Preview
Another best VSCode extension that helps to improve your development experience is Image Preview. This extension enables you to preview images directly in the editor. It works with a variety of image formats, including JPG, PNG, SVG, and GIF.
With this plugin installed, you can easily view images without leaving the editor. Additionally, the Image Preview extension comes with several options for customizing the display of images. This allows you to easily adjust the size and position of the images for better viewing.
10. Bracket Pair Colorization Toggler
The Bracket Pair Colorization Toggler is one of the best VSCode extensions for developers who are looking to make their coding experience easier and faster. This extension provides a toggle that enables or disables the bracket colorization feature in the editor, allowing you to quickly switch between different colors for different brackets.
The extension also adds extra highlighting for matching brackets, which is especially useful for debugging. With this extension, you can save time by not having to manually switch colors, and you can also easily find your way around complex code structures. This extension can really help you to improve your development experience.
11. vscode-icons
VSCode-icons is another amazing extension of VSCode for developers who need to easily identify files within their projects. This extension adds beautiful icons to your project files, allowing you to quickly identify the file.
This can be especially helpful when navigating through large projects with numerous folders and files. Not only does it help you recognize which file is which, but it can also make your code look more organized and professional. VSCode-icons is an excellent extension for all developers and is definitely worth a try if you’re looking to improve your workflow.
12. Auto Rename Tag
Auto Rename Tag allows developers to easily change the tags used in HTML and XML files without manually updating each tag. With Auto Rename Tag, users can quickly update the tags of elements, making it one of the best extensions for VSCode.
It also supports an array of languages, including HTML, XML, JSX, and more, ensuring that you’ll have no trouble editing code in your preferred language. Also, this extension also supports user-defined keybindings, meaning that you can customize your workflow to fit your development needs.
13. IntelliCode
IntelliCode is one of the best VSCode extensions that provide AI-assisted IntelliSense for all programming languages. This extension offers more intelligent coding assistance which helps developers make fewer mistakes and faster code completion.
It also gives smart recommendations on variable names, function parameters, and other coding patterns. With IntelliCode, developers can save time by quickly understanding existing code and quickly identifying errors.
It can also help new developers learn coding practices as they write their code. Additionally, it can be used to collaborate with other developers on projects more efficiently. IntelliCode is definitely a must-have plugin for developers who are looking to improve their development experience.
14. Open in Browser
Open in Browser extension helps developers quickly preview HTML files in a web browser. It provides an easy-to-use interface and allows developers to open multiple browsers at once.
This extension also supports many customizations, including file type associations, and it can be used to generate live preview URLs for sharing your work with others. With the Open in Browser extension, you can easily view the changes you make in real-time as you edit your HTML files. It’s an essential tool for any web developer and one of the best extensions for VSCode.
15. Path Intellisense
Path Intellisense is another best VSCode extensions for developers who work with a lot of files. It helps to easily and quickly find and insert the correct path to any file or folder in your project.
The extension automatically provides suggestions based on your file structure and can save a lot of time if you often need to switch between files.
Conclusion
These were some of the best VSCode extensions that can help you write better code. No matter what type of project you’re working on, there’s no doubt that you can benefit from using some of the VSCode extensions out there. Whether it’s improving your development experience, providing better debugging capabilities, or enhancing your coding productivity, these best extensions for VSCode have got you covered. With the selection of extensions listed here, you can ensure that you have all the tools you need to get the job done.
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