🌐
Visual Studio Marketplace
marketplace.visualstudio.com › items
Microsoft Visual Studio 2013 Installer Projects
Skip to content · Visual Studio · Marketplace · Sign in · Contact us · Privacy · Terms of use · Trademarks · © 2025 Microsoft
🌐
Microsoft
devblogs.microsoft.com › dev blogs › visual studio blog › visual studio installer projects extension
Visual Studio Installer Projects Extension - Visual Studio Blog
September 30, 2022 - We’re happy today to announce the preview availability of the Visual Studio Installer Projects Extension. This preview release provides support for Visual Studio Installer projects in Visual Studio 2013.
🌐
C# Corner
c-sharpcorner.com › UploadFile › 8a67c0 › creating-setup-file-with-visual-studio-2013
Creating Setup File With Visual Studio 2013
When you press OK, it will open InstallShield Limited Edition for Visual Studio page. Here you will find the link as Go to the download web site from where you can enable setup project with your Visual Studio. Click on the Go to the download web site and it will redirect you to some other page.
🌐
Dotnetmirror
dotnetmirror.com › articles › visualstudio › 147 › visual-studio-installer-project-back-with-visual-studio-2013
"Visual Studio Installer" project back with visual studio 2013 - DotNetMirror
The Article discuss about how "Visual Studio Installer" project is included with visual studio 2013 and how to set up the Visual Studio Installer Project preview extension.
🌐
Add-in-express
add-in-express.com › forum › read.php
Visual Studio 2013 Installer Projects extension - Add-in Express for IE forum
Plus, it includes all Add-in Express features such as True RAD, visual designers, Outlook view and form regions, etc. Extensions: VSTO-based application-level Office add-ins Applications: Outlook, Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Visio, InfoPath Office versions: 2003, 2007, 2010 (x86 and x64) IDE: VSTO 2005 SE, 2008, 2010; VB.NET, C# ... Get the best platform for building version-neutral, fast and easy deployable plug-ins by using Add-in Express projects templates, visual designers, components and wizards in combination with a perfect Delphi compiler.
Find elsewhere
Top answer
1 of 4
16

You need to add a setup project to your solution to build an installer executable.

Unfortunately Microsoft removed their setup project template from Visual Studio 2012 onwards, which would have done the job.

This means you are stuck with one of the alternatives, which are either less functional, harder to set up, or expensive.

NOTE - scroll down to EDIT 3 for my recommended solution. The rest of this post is just to highlight alternatives.

If you fancy the free route you can add on InstallShield Limited Edition to Visual studio, and use it to create a setup project for your solution. It will work for windows service setup projects in the latest version, but is generally considered pretty rubbish and limited. Here's the instructions for this: link

WiX is a free open source alternative, which is far more functional, but tricky to set up.

EDIT -

Here's an article describing how to use WiX to create a setup project: http://www.schiffhauer.com/wix-template-for-installing-a-windows-service/

EDIT 2 -

As of today (22/04/2014) Microsoft have reinstated the setup project in Visual Studio 2013 as an Visual studio extension - see this post

I've not tried it myself, but it's presumably the same as the VS2010 setup project, which wasn't too hard to learn (and there's plenty of help available on the internet) I'd definately recommend you try this for creating your setup program!

EDIT 3 (Apr 2016) -
I'd highly recommend you use the Visual Studio Installer Projects Extension (as mentioned in the above edit) for creating simple installers for your windows services (and other programs too). The installers it creates are simple, but professional looking enough for simple or small projects.

The extension for Visual Studio 2013 is here
The extension for Visual Studio 2015 is here
The extension for Visual Studio 2017 is here

An article describing how to create a setup project for a windows service using the old VS2010 Setup project is here. Although this is an old article it can be applied directly to the new Installer Project extensions linked above. (Thanks EbbnFlow for the link)

2 of 4
2

I ended up zipping up the software and including installutil.exe and simply gave the customer instructions have to install and uninstall.

Seems to have worked perfectly.

HTH

🌐
Microsoft
visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com › 9abe329c-9bba-44a1-be59-0fbf6151054d)
Visual Studio Marketplace
Skip to content · Visual Studio · Marketplace · Sign in · Contact us · Privacy · Terms of use · Trademarks · © 2025 Microsoft
🌐
InfoQ
infoq.com › news › 2014 › 04 › vs2013_installer_project
Better Late Than Never: Visual Studio Regains Installer Project - InfoQ
April 28, 2014 - Through Visual Studio 2010 Microsoft included a Setup and Deployment project type. With VS2012 this project type was removed and users were told to use InstallShield LE or seek a 3rd party alternative. Due to great user demand, Microsoft has now brought the previous project type back as an extension for VS2013.
🌐
Visual-installer
visual-installer.com › downloads.html
Visual & Installer - Downloads
You need to purchase license.key if you want to continue using the software with all features enabled. Tips for you: Visual & Installer can open VS Setup and Deployment projects (.vdproj files) and convert them to NSIS or Inno Setup script. This is a way how you can use your Setup projects in Visual Studio 2012 and 2013.
🌐
Visual Studio Marketplace
marketplace.visualstudio.com › items
Microsoft Visual Studio Installer Projects - Visual Studio Marketplace
Extension for Visual Studio - This official Microsoft extension provides support for Visual Studio Installer Projects in Visual Studio.
🌐
Microsoft Learn
learn.microsoft.com › en-us › visualstudio › deployment › installer-projects-net-core
Visual Studio Installer Projects and .NET | Microsoft Learn
Explore how to use the Visual Studio Installer Projects Extension to package .NET Core 3.1 or .NET 5 and later version applications for Microsoft Installer (MSI).
Top answer
1 of 3
4

There is also Advanced Installer which have a Visual Studio Installer extension (with UI) which is available in their free edition (from what I know). Their Installer extension for VS is also MSBuild compatible.

2 of 3
3

WiX is the default way to go for free solutions that need to do advanced steps and must be able to integrate into Team Build and MSBuild.

Product                  Free/Paid        VS designer    MsBuild Support
InstallShield LE              free                yes                yes
InstallShield Pro             paid                yes                yes
InstallAware                  paid                yes             yes 3)
Advanced Installer            free                yes                yes
NSIS                          free                 no                 no
MS VS Installer Projects      free                yes                 no
Wix Toolset                   free              no 1)                yes
InnoSetup                     free                 no                 no
PS App Deploy Toolkit         free              no 2)                 no

Remarks:

  1. There is an extension that seems to support a user interface for WiX
  2. Since it's PowerShell based you could use the Visual Studio PowerShell Tools.
  3. Advanced Installer can generate an MSBuild compatible .*proj file on request.

Links to products:

  • InstallShield
  • Install Aware
  • Advanced Installer
  • Microsoft Visual Studio Installer Projects 2013
  • WiX Toolset
  • WiX Visual Studio extension
  • NSIS
  • InnoSetup
  • PS AppDeploy Toolkit

Remember that Team Build 2013 has a set of native extension points that allow you to execute PowerShell scripts after build which can trigger pretty much every type of installer project you need. Non-MSBuild-based systems like the PS AppDeploy Toolkit or NSIS can be triggered with relative ease this way.

XML and script-based UI's are generally easier to merge and branch and provide better maintainability over time as you're pretty much free to define the modules in separate files and provide comments on why certain files are deployed where or which commands are executed when.

🌐
Hexaviewtech
hexaviewtech.com › blog › setup-project-using-microsoft-visual-studio-installer-projects-extension
Setup Project using Microsoft Visual Studio Installer Projects Extension
This blog will guide you through a step-by-step tutorial on how we can set up the project using Microsoft Visual Studio Installer Projects Extension. Step
🌐
Should I Remove It?
shouldiremoveit.com › Visual-Studio-Installer-Projects-Extension-for-Microsoft-Visual-Studio-2013-129429-program.aspx
Should I remove Visual Studio Installer Projects Extension for Microsoft Visual Studio 2013 by Microsoft?
Visual Studio Installer Projects Extension for Microsoft Visual Studio 2013 is a software program developed by Microsoft. The primary executable is named vsi_bundle.exe. The setup package is about 970.13 KB (993,410 bytes) when donwloaded. Relative to the overall usage of users who have this ...