JetBrains offers CLion, a cross-platform IDE for C and C+.
$9.90
per month per user
Visual Studio
Score8.8 out of 10
N/A
Visual Studio (now in the 2022 edition) is a 64-bit IDE that makes it easier to work with bigger projects and complex workloads, boasting a fluid and responsive experience for users. The IDE features IntelliCode, its automatic code completion tools that understand code context and that can complete up to a whole line at once to drive accurate and confident coding.
$45
per month
Pricing
CLion
Visual Studio
Editions & Modules
CLion for Individuals
$99
per year per user
CLion for Organizations
$229
per year per user
All Products Pack for Individuals
$289
per year per user
All Products Pack for Organizations
$779
per year per user
Professional
$45.00
per month
Enterprise
$250.00
per month
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
CLion
Visual Studio
Free Trial
Yes
No
Free/Freemium Version
No
Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
—
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More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
CLion
Visual Studio
Considered Both Products
JetBrains
Verified User
Chose CLion
Most IDEs are huge both in disk and memory which causes it to run slow, where CLion is much smaller and faster. That's what I loved about CLion, compared to its rivals. Not to mention its extensive abilities and functions in the debugging process, thanks to which, we were able …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose CLion
Visual Studio is the "standard" IDE most people use. It's expensive but generally worth the cost. Where CLion comes into play, people are less concerned with using the Microsoft solution and are open to another party providing them the key IDE resource they need. It's taking a …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Microsoft
Verified User
Chose Visual Studio
I work mostly in C++ so CLion from Jetbrains is a nice alternative...but it just doesn't stack up to Visual Studio. My paid version of VS meets all of my development needs and has done so for more than two decades so I see no reason to look any further. That said, I have looked …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Visual Studio
Visual Studio IDE is a much more comprehensive package with a lot of libraries that come out-of-the-package, compared to its rivals/alternatives who have some specialization and niche areas. Due to this nature, it is possible to develop any kind of software, using almost all …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
CLion from JetBrains and Microsoft’s Visual Studio are cross-platform integrated development environments (IDEs). CLion is built to support development in C and C++ and is a paid service with advanced features. Visual Studio is freemium that offers paid editions as well. Its editors support a variety of languages (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and JSON,etc.), and it can be used as an XML editor. Visual Studio is one of the most widely used IDEs in the world and is deployed at businesses of all sizes, and in home studios used actively by solo devs. CLion, as a paid service focused on C/C++ development, is deployed primarily at larger entities, often purchased as part of JetBrains All Products Pack where it sits beside the company’s more commonly used products (e.g. IntelliJ Idea).
Features
For building applications, there are plenty of reasons to use either Visual Studio, or CLion.
Visual Studio is a well regarded all-in-one IDE for development, available offline or online with strong debugging, as well as IntelliSense autocomplete, and refactoring. Because of its freemium delivery model and strength in supporting Windows .NET development (or full stack development) it is an integral part of many developer’s toolboxes. You will use it for something, and you probably won’t mind. Because it is easy to look at with a pleasing and efficiency generating UI (users like the light, love the dark), clear outputs that are easy to understand, and integration with Azure DevOps and Git, or other frequently used version control systems and DevOps tools.
CLion is a strong IDE, but primarily for C and C++ development, though it supports other languages. It is not an all-in-one, rather it is a power tool for C/C++ with an overall high rating for core IDE functionality. It resembles other JetBrains products in its look and functionality, so users of products such as IntelliJ Idea, WebStorm, or PyCharm may find it easy to use, with similar strengths to those products. It supports CMake, and VIM for coding, is easy to grasp with almost no learning curve at all for JetBrains pros, and while there is no free version, its price is regarded as cheap and fair, and it has a free student license to help get student developers get trained up and familiar with JetBrains’ tools.
Limitations
While both products are complete IDE tools, there are some limitations for each that may dissuade users from choosing Visual Studio or CLion for their particular project.
CLion is not the first choice for development that is not in C/C++. Also, it lacks a built-in compiler and compiler installation is subpar. Furthermore, it only runs on 64 bit systems (not 32 bit systems).
Visual Studio can struggle with speed, sporting a slow startup, sluggish performance during operation, and frustratingly high memory consumption throughout. It is a feature loaded tool, but many features are difficult to locate, difficult to remember where they are or even difficult to understand what they do. While Visual Studio is well supported and regularly updated, users express annoyance at excess shuffling and change in the functionality, location, or operability of seldom used but needed features that can create aggravation.
Pricing
Both CLion and Visual Studio can be tried, learned, and used for free; Visual Studio is free for all, and CLion is available for free on a student license. Otherwise, CLion is available per user for $199 the first year, $159 the second, and $119 subsequent years. A better option may be to obtain it on the JetBrains All Products Pack, bundled with IntelliJ Idea and other popular IDEs and tools, for $649 first year, $519 second year, and $389 subsequent years. For Microsoft’s Visual Studio, its Professional plan includes extra features and services as well as Azure DevOps/Azure DevOps Server features for $1,199 per year (optionally, $45 monthly), and $799 for renewals.The Visual Studio Enterprise plans includes Azure DevOps features (Test Plans, Artifacts, self-hosted pipelines) for a $250 monthly subscription, or with advanced support for annual subscriptions starting at $5,999 the first year, and $2,569 for renewals.
It's a great fit if you’re looking for a user-friendly C++ IDE; comfortable with using Vim; looking for a fast, intuitive UI; or teaching your students C/C++. It wouldn’t be a good fit if you’re more comfortable with command-line based IDEs or planning to code in multiple languages, as it only supports C and C++.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
When working with base C# code for desktop and web projects, then Microsoft Visual Studio is ideal as it provides the libraries and interfaces needed to quickly create, test and deploy solutions. It is when slightly more complex scenarios are required that issues can arise. The built-in integration for things like PowerBI Paginated Reports and dashboards is far from ideal.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
JetBrains, the company that created and maintains CLion, is located primarily in Russia. While that doesn't concern me it does create worries for some people.
No real cons. The product is great and the support is equally excellent.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
VS is the best and is required for building Microsoft applications. The quality and usefulness of the product far out-weight the licensing costs associated with it.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
CLion does everything I ask it to do. For me, Unreal Engine 4 compatibility was essential and Epic Game and JetBrains delivered a solid alternative to spending a huge amount of money on the "standard" IDE for game development on Windows. The user interface is sharp and modern without all of the silly frills many software suites now employ. It integrates well with source control systems we use and also works well, as expected, with other JetBrains development tools and assistants.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
I love the overall usability of Microsoft Visual Studio. I’ve been using this IDE for more than 20 years, and I’ve seen it evolve by leaps and bounds. Today, with AI and code-suggestion/completion features, developers no longer need to remember countless libraries, methods, or language syntax, or invest a huge amount of programming effort to complete a project. It truly offers everything a developer needs to program, debug, test, and deploy in a single IDE.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
I am giving it a 9 out of 10 because I did not even need official support from the CLion team but rather, every time I came across a problem, I have been able to solve it within the community itself. This is so precious that you don't even need the help of the program's development/support team. There's a huge community of users that backs you up.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
There are many resources available supporting Visual Studio IDE. Microsoft whitepapers, forum posts, and online Visual Studio documentation. There are countless demonstration videos available, as well. If users are having issues, they can call Microsoft Support, but depending on the company's agreement with Microsoft, the number of included support calls will vary from organization to organization. I've found that Microsoft support calls can be hit or miss depending on who you get, but they can usually get you with the right support person for your issue.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
IT is very complicated to understand all the functions that the environment has if you are not familiar with this type of development environments. It is important to select a good in-person training to achieve to understand all the possibilities and the capacity of the application. In this case, you will be able to develop a lot type of different applications.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
If you are not accustomed to develop in this type of development environments it would be complicated to follow all the parts of the course because if the course does not include a great tour with all the concepts to develop you will not have the option to understand all the functions.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
I personally feel Visual Studio IDE has [a] better interface and [is more] user friendly than other IDEs. It has better code maintainability and intellisense. Its inbuilt team foundation server help coders to check on their code then and go. Better nugget package management, quality testing and gives features to extract TRX file as result of testing which includes all the summary of each test case.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Using the integration between Visual Studio and our source control service, the cost of re-work and losing code is drastically reduced.
Paid versions of Visual Studio enable developers to be so much more productive than hacked-together open source solutions that it's hard to imagine developing in Windows without it.
When combined with support subscriptions and the vast array of free online help options available, Visual Studio saves our developers time by keeping them coding and testing, not wasting their time trying to guess their way out of problems or spend endless hours online hoping to find answers.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
