Does CLion IDE include all features which ReSharper C++ provides under Visual Studio?

The choice between CLion and ReSharper C++ is usually dictated by your development environment.

  • CLion is a standalone cross-platform IDE based on the IntelliJ platform. It is an option when your project uses CMake to manage the build process and GCC/Clang as the compiler.
  • On the other hand, if you are using Visual Studio as your IDE and compile your project using the Microsoft toolset, then you should be using ReSharper C++.

CLion includes a lot of functionality that R++ simply does not need (because it's running on top of Visual Studio) - for example, a debugger UI for GDB/LLDB and support for editing CMake files. Additionally, all the usual goodies of the IntelliJ platform are available, including integration with VCS systems, numerous plugins and support for other languages (e.g. Swift, Python, JavaScript, HTML/CSS and others).

ReSharper C++ is a Visual Studio extension, so it uses the Visual Studio project model and supports various peculiarities of the MSVC compiler. It also has a more precise code model than CLion and provides more code generation options, on-the-fly code analyses and context actions (most of them are listed on the comparison with Visual Assist X page). In addition to Google Test supported by CLion, R++ can also run tests written using the Boost.Test framework.

In the end if you have a chance, do try both and see which you like more - both products have a free 30-day evaluation period.


I haven't used either one recently, but comparing the latest online help, CLion appears to have all the refactorings of ReSharper C++, plus several more:

https://www.jetbrains.com/help/resharper/Refactorings_for_CPP.html https://www.jetbrains.com/help/clion/refactoring-source-code.html

In addition, CLion provides several "Intention Actions" which appear to be similar to ReSharper's "Context Actions." The ReSharper help lists about 56 C++ specific context actions plus 14 language-independent context actions. The CLion help doesn't provide a complete list of intention actions, but looking at the scrollbar in the screenshot of the "Preferences" dialog, I'd guesstimate there about 180 intention actions.

https://www.jetbrains.com/help/clion/intention-actions.html https://www.jetbrains.com/help/resharper/Reference__Options__Languages__CPP__Context_Actions.html