How to rename an existing Visual Studio project?

Renaming an existing Visual Studio Project

Step 1.
Create a backup of your project.

Step 2.
Rename the root folder to new name.

Step 3.
Open the solution file in Visual Studio.

Step 4.
Update the name of the Solution & Project file via VS.

Step 5.
Update the Assembly and Default Namespace Name.

Step 6.
Update Assembly Information ( Title & Product Names).

Step 7.

Step 8.
Rename the project sub-folder to new name.

Step 9.
Open the Solution file in Visual Studio.

Step 10.
Remove and then add the project file in the solution explorer.

Visual Studio 2015 Enterprise edition used for the video purpose.

[TurboWindex]

When you need a 6min tutorial to change a project name, gg visual studio.

[danielcrotty]

You probably wont see this, but thank you. It was very helpful.

in 2021
if this is a clone and making some changes, you may want to update the Manifest.
Packaging assets : If you dont, they will both use the same location (Package Name).
Visual Assets in the images will be point ing to the wrong directory

[markyap]

Update. I just renamed an existing VS project.
Your Guide is so systemic and detailed.
It was effortless for me.
Just "Super"
Thank you very much again

[LiranDagan]

dudes at microsoft never heard of the rename option

[findingborgar]

Thank you pretty much! For changing namespace i suggest to find and replace all the namespace. For MVC projects, you should delete all the files in folder "bin" and folder "obj"

[nerdii]

Microsoft should definitely make this easier to do. We shouldn't have to watch a 6 minute tutorial to change the name of our project.

[SomeoneElseOverHere]

You definitely earned a like from me.
I noticed fairly late into my project that I'd forgotten to correctly name it, and your video helped me solve it wonderfully.
Thank you. It helped me out a lot.

[georgetuccio]

Very nice. Thank you very much. I'm using Visual Studio 2019 and it's June 2020 and this still worked. In fact, I have Entity Framework in my project too. My "problem" at the end presented different though. You had that error on the Project and you knew to delete and add again. Mine did not present that way. So, I rebuilt and tried to run and got an error. I have a MVC project, that was different too, and Routing was still looking for a "phantom" controller by the same name in the old namespace. Where the heck? Well, I found a most-helpful post on StackOverflow that said, delete any left over bin .DLLs. And, there were 3 with the old Assembly name. So, routing was "finding" a 2nd Home Controller there. I deleted all 3 and, for the heck of it, did a Rebuilt too, and it worked.

[RealAlexMoreton]

HERO! Why Microsoft has made it so difficult i don't know! Thank you :)

[Fro]

Very helpful video, thank you for this. Just tried this in VS2017 in 2020 and worked like a charm.

[carlosrg]

I used this video to rename a 2013 project with slight differences but works like a charm, thx much Sankalp

[mewt]

Thanks! I can't believe visual studio is so advanced but also lacks useful stuff like "renaming projects" in an automated way .*_*

[feraudyh]

I was looking for information on C++ projects, but this provides part of the answer.

[carlosp.trevino]

Thank you Sankalp! Very detailed explanation.

[pavanmanideep]

Thanks for helping out other developers

[vishvajeetdeshmukh]

July 2021... Still helpful.. thank you!!

[markyap]

Thank you very much. Written steps is a big help !

[berenedain]

Holy crap thanks for this! Now I can rename the project from "This-Is-A-Test"! 😆

[applepie]

thank you so much!!! I was struggling with renaming my project and your tutorial for real safed me

[shiumanizar]

Thank you... I thought I was an idiot for not knowing because it seems so simple but actually there's so many steps just to rename a file eh? :")