Dotnet Skills is live · free · last verified 8 Nov 2026 · viability monitor
Dotnet Skills
Install versioned .NET skills into AI coding assistants with the free dotnet-skills catalog of 203 skills
Free, MIT-licensed, and it fixes the failure mode we see most often with AI assistants on .NET — confidently wrong middleware and lifecycle details. The per-skill token counts are the underrated part: you budget context instead of dumping a 485k-token catalog into a prompt. Only worth installing if your team actually lives in .NET.
Verdict generatedVerified 5d ago · liveness 69/100 · cite: rightaichoice.com/tools/dotnet-skills
- .NET developers whose AI assistant keeps getting middleware, render-mode, and lifecycle details wrong
- Platform teams standardizing AI code generation across ASP.NET Core, Blazor, or MAUI codebases
- Teams modernizing EF6, MSBuild, or legacy .NET projects and needing migration-aware context
- Developers budgeting context windows who want per-skill token cost visibility before install
- Non-.NET developers — the entire catalog is Microsoft-stack specific
- Anyone not using Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Gemini, Codex, or Junie
- Teams wanting a hosted skill marketplace with admin controls and shared analytics
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Skip dotnet-skills if your assistant isn't Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Gemini, Codex, or Junie, or if your stack isn't .NET — there's no GUI, no cloud sync, and nothing outside the Microsoft ecosystem.
Treat cost as $0 for the CLI itself; the real spend is the AI assistant seat you already pay for, plus the context window each installed skill consumes (ASP.NET Core 1,842 tokens, Aspire 3,139, the quality bundle 14,215 as a set).
In short
Dotnet Skills — Install versioned .NET skills into AI coding assistants with the free dotnet-skills catalog of 203 skills. Best for .NET developers whose AI assistant keeps getting middleware, render-mode, and lifecycle details wrong, Platform teams standardizing AI code generation across ASP.NET Core, Blazor, or MAUI codebases, Teams modernizing EF6, MSBuild, or legacy .NET projects and needing migration-aware context. Free to use.
What is Dotnet Skills?
Dotnet Skills — Install versioned .NET skills into AI coding assistants with the free dotnet-skills catalog of 203 skills. Best for .NET developers whose AI assistant keeps getting middleware, render-mode, and lifecycle details wrong, Platform teams standardizing AI code generation across ASP.NET Core, Blazor, or MAUI codebases, Teams modernizing EF6, MSBuild, or legacy .NET projects and needing migration-aware context. Free to use.
dotnet-skills is a free, MIT-licensed .NET global tool that feeds framework-aware context into AI coding assistants — Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Gemini, Codex, Junie — so you stop hand-tuning prompts about middleware order, Blazor render modes, and EF lifetime rules. The catalog is versioned; today's homepage ships catalog-v2026.11.8.0 with 203 skills, 12 bundles, 26 agents, 23 collections, 485,415 skill tokens, and explicit mappings for 54 NuGet packages. That's a steady climb from the 179-skill catalog-v2026.7.22.0 build and the 190-skill October release logged at 447,165 tokens. Discovery runs on two surfaces. Collections (23) let you browse Collection → Lane → Skill when you want lane context; bundles give you one command per preset once the direction is clear. Agents orchestrate linked skills at once. Or start from existing code: `dotnet skills install --auto` scans your .csproj files and matches the NuGet packages you reference. Skills stay small and inspectable. ML.NET weighs 430 tokens, Blazor component authoring 831, the ASP.NET Core Web API guide 4,866, and the Microsoft Agent Framework skill 3,400. Token accounting is built in: `dotnet skills catalog tokens --catalog-root .` exports per-skill counts so you see what each chunk of context costs before it lands in a prompt window. It's built for .NET developers and platform teams already running an AI coding assistant who want framework-correct output without babysitting prompts. Scope is the constraint — the catalog is Microsoft-stack through and through, so polyglot teams outside .NET get little from it. Compare it to hunting through framework docs by hand or coaxing a general-purpose assistant into remembering ASP.NET Core conventions: this replaces both with versioned files you can audit.
Key features
- Versioned .NET skill catalog, currently catalog-v2026.11.8.0 with 203 skills
- 203 curated .NET skill files spanning frameworks, tooling, and diagnostics
- 485,415 total skill tokens with per-skill cost visibility
- 26 routing agents that orchestrate multiple linked skills at once
- 12 bundles for one-command grouped installs
- 23 collections for browsing the catalog via Collection → Lane → Skill
- Explicit NuGet package mappings covering 54 packages
- CLI install via dotnet tool install --global dotnet-skills
- Auto-detect NuGet packages in .csproj with dotnet skills install --auto
- Interactive collection and lane control center via dotnet skills
- Structured SKILL.md files with routing and validation metadata
- Per-skill token export via dotnet skills catalog tokens
- Upstream-watch automation tracking official .NET releases and docs
- Local-first operation with no cloud component
Behind the verdict
Where this earns its place: your assistant keeps producing plausible-but-wrong ASP.NET Core and Blazor code, and you're tired of pasting the same corrections into every chat. Installing a skill file once and having it version-controlled beats that ritual. We'd reach for it on platform teams that need consistency. Pinning catalog-v2026.11.8.0 means every developer's assistant answers the same way about EF lifetime and render modes — that's a real onboarding win, and one you can diff in code review. When to pass: if your repos are Node, Python, or Go, the 203 skills here mostly don't apply. And if you want a shared admin dashboard showing who installed what, this is a local-first CLI, not a hosted platform. The token accounting is the part people skip. A 485,415-token catalog sounds impressive until you realize you don't want it all in context. The `catalog tokens` export lets you install the 430-token ML.NET skill and skip the 4,866-token Web API monster if your project doesn't need it. Budget the context like you'd budget memory. The cadence is worth watching. The catalog moved from 179 skills in July to 190 in October to 203 today. If your team can't re-validate skills after an update, schedule the bumps rather than taking them mid-sprint. Closest alternative: hand-curated prompt files checked into your repo. Those work, but you own the maintenance and nobody upstreams fixes when Microsoft ships a new execution model. For .NET shops the tradeoff favors the CLI; for everyone else, it doesn't apply.
Limitations
- You need the dotnet-skills CLI plus one of the supported assistants (Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Gemini, Codex, Junie).
- Skills are static text files published from the catalog (currently catalog-v2026.11.8.0 with 203 skills, 12 bundles, 26 agents), so there are no real-time updates.
- Coverage is limited to the .NET catalog with explicit mappings for 54 NuGet packages, so niche libraries may not be represented.
- Everything runs through terminal commands; the catalog is MIT-licensed and local-first with no cloud component.
as of 2026-10-09
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Is Dotnet Skills still active?
Dotnet Skills is live · free · last verified 8 Nov 2026 · viability monitor.
Viability score
How well maintained and how widely used is Dotnet Skills? Built from what the vendor actually publishes (docs, changelog, tutorials, integrations, pricing), whether the site is live, and how much real users discuss it. How we calculate this
Last calculated: November 2026
How we score →What's new in Dotnet Skills
Checked 8 days agoAcross the latest 1 update: 1 changelog entry.
What do users say about Dotnet Skills?
What people actually say about Dotnet Skills — is it worth it?
Our community sentiment research written Jul 6, 2026 is more than 90 days old, so it is being re-reviewed against current data and is not shown.
How we verified this
Every listed fact about Dotnet Skills — pricing, features, links, status — is re-read from the vendor's own pages by our verification pipeline and each change is logged with a date; the last pass ran on 8 Nov 2026. Analysis is drafted with AI models and checked against our editorial standards before publishing; see how we verify.
Verification history
We have re-verified Dotnet Skills 13 times since . Each pass re-reads the vendor's own pages and re-checks every listed field against that evidence; passes where nothing had changed are marked as such.
- — changed SSL certificate
- — changed description, summary, our verdict, pricing tiers, features, pricing page, limitations
- — changed pricing tiers, features, description, our verdict
- — changed pricing page, limitations
- — changed description, who should skip it, summary, our verdict, features, who it suits, pricing tiers
- — changed pricing page, limitations
Showing the 6 most recent of 13 verification passes.
Free to cite with attribution — this page re-verifies continuously.
How much does Dotnet Skills cost in 2026?
Dotnet Skills: Free to use. Pricing last verified 8 Nov 2026.
Plans compared
Every published Dotnet Skills tier, its price as the vendor publishes it, who it fits, and what it adds over the tier below. The 12-month cost projection follows.
| Plan | Price | Billing | Who it's for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Source | Free | — | Any .NET developer or platform team already paying for Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Gemini, Codex, or Junie who wants framework-correct assistant output without a new line item.Adds: Starting tier: MIT-licensed CLI, full 190-skill catalog, 12 bundles, 26 agents, auto-detect from .csproj, and per-skill token export — all local, no cloud component. |
12-month cost
Project the real annual outlay, including the implied monthly cost when only an annual tier is published.
Vendor list price only. Add-on usage, seat overages, and contract minimums are surfaced under Hidden costs & gotchas.
Where the pricing makes sense
The company stage and team size where Dotnet Skills's pricing actually pencils out — and where peers do it cheaper.
Treat cost as $0 for the CLI itself; the real spend is the AI assistant seat you already pay for, plus the context window each installed skill consumes (ASP.NET Core 1,842 tokens, Aspire 3,139, the quality bundle 14,215 as a set).
Has Dotnet Skills' pricing changed?
No plan price for Dotnet Skills has moved since we began logging in Aug 2026; the pricing page is re-read on every verification pass.
Who should pick Dotnet Skills?
Pick Dotnet Skills if you are .NET developers whose AI assistant keeps getting middleware, render-mode, and lifecycle details wrong, Platform teams standardizing AI code generation across ASP.NET Core, Blazor, or MAUI codebases, Teams modernizing EF6, MSBuild, or legacy .NET projects and needing migration-aware context, Developers budgeting context windows who want per-skill token cost visibility before install.
Look elsewhere if you are Non-.NET developers — the entire catalog is Microsoft-stack specific, Anyone not using Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Gemini, Codex, or Junie, Teams wanting a hosted skill marketplace with admin controls and shared analytics, Groups expecting real-time collaboration or team dashboards.
Skip it if Skip dotnet-skills if your assistant isn't Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Gemini, Codex, or Junie, or if your stack isn't .NET — there's no GUI, no cloud sync, and nothing outside the Microsoft ecosystem.
GeneratedReal-world workflow fit
Concrete scenarios for the personas Dotnet Skills actually fits — and what changes day-one when you adopt it.
Run dotnet tool install --global dotnet-skills, then dotnet skills install --auto to scan the .csproj and match the Microsoft.AspNetCore.* and Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.* packages already referenced.
Outcome: Copilot answers with correct hosting, middleware, and EF Core migration patterns instead of generic C# that needs hand-correction.
Install the foundations bundle (4 skills, 4,432 tokens) plus the Aspire Orchestrator agent, which routes to aspire, aspnet-core, and six more linked skills.
Outcome: Every developer's assistant inherits the same framework baseline, so review comments shift from middleware mistakes to actual design.
Install the entity-framework6 skill (1,036 tokens) alongside entity-framework-core (2,138 tokens), or use the Data orchestration agent, to get migration-aware guidance on what to keep versus modernize.
Outcome: Migration planning stops hand-waving the EF6-to-EF-Core boundary, and you can see the context cost of both skills before committing.
Use cases
- Installing the Blazor skill to get accurate component design, state flow, and rendering patterns in GitHub Copilot
- Auto-detecting NuGet packages from your .csproj and installing matching skills with one command
- Using the interactive control center to browse collections and compare skills before installing
- Installing the .NET Aspire Orchestrator agent to route multi-skill context across eight linked skills for cloud-native work
- Measuring skill tokens to understand the context cost of each skill before adding it to your assistant
- Installing the quality bundle in one command to get formatter, analyzer, complexity, and CRAP analysis guidance
- Installing the Microsoft Agent Framework Router to route agent-vs-workflow and AgentThread state decisions
- Contributing a new skill for your favorite .NET library by submitting a pull request to the catalog
Setup time & first value
How long it actually takes to get something useful out of Dotnet Skills — broken out by persona, not the marketing-page minute.
Roughly 5-10 minutes end to end: `dotnet tool install --global dotnet-skills` installs the CLI, `dotnet skills install --auto` matches your .csproj NuGet references, and a single bundle command (for example the 4-skill foundations bundle) lays down a baseline. Browsing via `dotnet skills` and the 23 collections takes longer if you want to audit before installing.
Switching to or from Dotnet Skills
How to bring data in from common predecessors and how to get it back out — written for the switcher, not the buyer.
- →From a hand-maintained prompt/rules file: run dotnet skills install --auto to derive targeted skills from your .csproj, then delete the generic rules file.
- →From a shared prompt doc: install the foundations (4 skills, 4,432 tokens) or quality (10 skills, 14,215 tokens) bundle to replace prose guidance with versioned SKILL.md files.
- →From no assistant guidance at all: start with dotnet skills to browse the 23 collections, then install the bundle matching your stack.
- ↗To a hosted prompt marketplaces with admin analytics: dotnet-skills has no cloud sync, team workspace, or admin console, so you'd export the SKILL.md files you rely on.
- ↗To a non-.NET stack (Python, Node, JVM): nothing carries over — the 190-skill catalog is entirely .NET and Microsoft-stack specific.
Integrations
Resources & guides
Tutorials & Learning
YouTube returned 6 videos for “Dotnet Skills”, and we withheld 6: 6 did not mention Dotnet Skills. We are showing none, because we could not prove any of them are about Dotnet Skills.
Official links
What are the best Dotnet Skills alternatives?
The closest alternatives to Dotnet Skills we list are Ui Ux Pro Max Skill, Design.MD and DevoxxGenieIDEAPlugin. Ranked by direct product-type match, not category overlap.
| Alternative | Pricing | Starts at | Last verified |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ui Ux Pro Max Skill | Free | Free | — |
| Design.MD | Freemium | Pricing not published | — |
| DevoxxGenieIDEAPlugin | Free | Free | — |
Alternatives to Dotnet Skills
View all
Ui Ux Pro Max Skill
Free open-source design-intelligence skill that feeds UI styles, palettes, fonts, and chart rules into Claude Code, Cursor, and other AI coding assistants.
Design.MD
A DESIGN.md catalog that hands your AI coding agent real brand colors, type and spacing
DevoxxGenieIDEAPlugin
Free open-source JetBrains AI code assistant with agentic coding, spec-driven development and local LLM support
Tools that pair well with Dotnet Skills
Common stack mates teams adopt alongside Dotnet Skills, with the specific reason each pairing earns its keep.
Ui Ux Pro Max Skill
Free open-source design-intelligence skill that feeds UI styles, palettes, fonts, and chart rules into Claude Code, Cursor, and other AI coding assistants.
Design.MD
A DESIGN.md catalog that hands your AI coding agent real brand colors, type and spacing
DevoxxGenieIDEAPlugin
Free open-source JetBrains AI code assistant with agentic coding, spec-driven development and local LLM support
Dotnet Skills vs its closest rival
Dotnet Skills's closest head-to-head is with Bito.
Our Dotnet Skills vs Bito verdict written Jul 6, 2026 is more than 90 days old, so it is being re-reviewed against current data and is not shown.
Head-to-head comparisons
Frequently asked questions
Categories
For makers of Dotnet Skills
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