Unlock the Full Power

Be honest: you've probably tried LINQPad before and quit within five minutes.

You opened it, typed some code, and... nothing. No autocompletion. No IntelliSense. No suggestions. Just a blank editor staring back at you like Notepad with a run button. "This is what everyone raves about?" you thought. And you closed it.

Here's what nobody told you: the magic is hiding behind the paid license.

Free LINQPad is deliberately stripped down. It runs code beautifully—the .Dump() method, database connectivity, the full .NET ecosystem—but the experience of writing that code feels primitive. There's no hand-holding, no discovery, no "what methods are available here?" You have to already know what you're doing.

That's not a bug. It's the business model. And honestly? It's a terrible first impression that causes thousands of developers to dismiss one of the most powerful tools in the .NET ecosystem.

The paid editions don't just add features—they fundamentally change what LINQPad feels like. Autocompletion that anticipates your intent. A debugger that runs inside LINQPad. NuGet package management without leaving your workflow. And an AI assistant that understands your database schema, validates its own code, and helps you solve problems in seconds instead of hours.

Let me show you what you've been missing.

Autocompletion That Actually Helps

You know that moment when you're exploring an unfamiliar API? You type a dot, hoping to discover what methods are available... and nothing happens. In free LINQPad, you're on your own. You alt-tab to documentation, search, read, come back, try again.

With a paid license, you type that dot and everything appears—methods, properties, extension methods, complete with parameter hints and documentation. It's not just faster; it's a completely different experience of learning and exploration.

var client = new HttpClient();
client.  // <- In Pro/Developer/Premium: instant method list with signatures

This isn't just about typing speed. It's about discovery. When you can see every available method the moment you need it, you find capabilities you didn't know existed. You write better code because you can see better options.

The Debugger You Didn't Know You Needed

"But I have .Dump()," you might say. "I can see everything."

True. And for most LINQPad work, Dump is all you need. But there are moments—tracing through complex logic, understanding exactly why that conditional failed, stepping through async code—where a proper debugger is invaluable.

LINQPad's built-in debugger gives you:

• Breakpoints — Pause execution exactly where you need to
• Step through — Line by line, watching variables change
• Variable inspection — Hover to see values, expand objects, watch expressions
• Async debugging — Works seamlessly with async/await
• Multi-threaded debugging — Thread windows, context switching

And here's the key difference from Visual Studio: you're debugging scripts, not projects. No build step. No waiting. Set a breakpoint, hit F5, and you're there. The speed advantage of LINQPad remains intact.

![Screenshot needed: LINQPad debugger with breakpoints and variable inspection]

NuGet Without the Friction

The free version of LINQPad can use NuGet packages—you can paste package references, and they'll restore. But managing them? That's a different story.

With Developer or Premium, you get a fully integrated NuGet Package Manager:

• Search the entire NuGet ecosystem directly from LINQPad
• One-click installation of any package
• Version management — Upgrade, downgrade, see what's available
• Vulnerability alerts — LINQPad warns you about packages with known CVEs
• Local cache — Packages download once, shared across all your scripts

Press F4 to open Query Properties, click "Add NuGet," and search. That's it. The friction between "I wonder if there's a library for this" and "I'm using that library" drops to nearly zero.

// With integrated NuGet, adding a library takes seconds:
// F4 → Add NuGet → "Humanizer" → Click Add → Done

using Humanizer;

DateTime.Now.AddDays(-3).Humanize().Dump();  // "3 days ago"

AI That Actually Understands Your Code

LINQPad 9 Premium includes an AI assistant unlike anything else in the .NET ecosystem. This isn't a chatbot bolted onto an IDE. It's deeply integrated:

Schema-Aware Intelligence

Connect to a database and the AI understands your schema. It knows your tables, relationships, column types. Ask it to write a query, and it generates valid SQL or LINQ that actually works against your data.

Compiler-Validated Output

Here's what makes LINQPad's AI special: when it generates code, LINQPad's compiler validates it automatically. If there's an error, the AI sees the compiler message and fixes itself. You don't get broken code snippets that you have to debug—you get working code.

Red/Green Diffing for Refactoring

Ask the AI to refactor your code, and you see exactly what changes—additions in green, deletions in red. You're in control. Accept the changes, reject them, or ask for something different.

Your Models, Your Account

LINQPad's AI works with OpenAI, Anthropic Claude, Google Gemini, or OpenRouter. You use your own API key, pay-as-you-go. No monthly subscription to another service—just the cost of the tokens you actually use.

// Select this code, press Ctrl+I, and ask:
// "Optimize this for performance and explain what you changed"

var result = customers
    .Where(c => c.Orders.Any())
    .Select(c => new { c.Name, OrderCount = c.Orders.Count() })
    .ToList();

SQL-to-LINQ Conversion

You've got a complex SQL query that works. Now you need it in LINQ—maybe for a C# application, maybe because LINQ is more composable for your use case. Manually translating SQL to LINQ is tedious and error-prone.

LINQPad Premium includes a SQL-to-LINQ converter that goes far beyond simple translation:

• Schema-aware — Uses your actual database relationships
• Association properties — Generates clean navigation instead of manual joins
• Best practices — Follows LINQ patterns, avoids anti-patterns
• Multiple frameworks — Supports both LINQ-to-SQL and Entity Framework Core

Paste your SQL, get clean LINQ. It's not just a time-saver—it's a learning tool that shows you how LINQ models the same logic.

50+ Code Fixes and Refactorings

Developer and Premium editions include intelligent code actions that fix and improve your code:

• Implement interfaces — One click to generate all required members
• Override methods — Automatic generation with proper signatures
• Convert to modern syntax — Raw strings, pattern matching, and more
• Smart namespace imports — Missing using statements resolved instantly
• Code formatting — Clean, consistent style throughout

These are the same refactoring capabilities that make Visual Studio productive, now available in your LINQPad scripts. The difference is speed—you're not waiting for a project to build between each change.

Cross-Database Querying

Working with data spread across multiple databases on the same server? Premium edition lets you query across them:

// Query data from multiple databases in a single script
from customer in Customers            // Database A
join order in OtherDb.Orders          // Database B
    on customer.Id equals order.CustomerId
select new { customer.Name, order.Total }

For data analysis and reporting, this capability is transformative. No more exporting to CSV, importing, and joining manually. Just query.

Direct Table Editing

Sometimes you need to fix data—a typo in a customer name, a wrong status code, a test record that shouldn't be there. With Developer or Premium, you can edit SQL tables directly in LINQPad:

• Open any table as a grid
• Edit values in place
• Save changes back to the database
• No UPDATE statements required

This is faster than writing SQL for one-off fixes, and safer than typing UPDATE commands without a WHERE clause sanity check.

Which Edition Is Right for You?

The Real Calculation

Think about your hourly rate. Now think about how many hours you'll spend this year:

• Searching documentation because autocompletion wasn't there
• Alt-tabbing to NuGet.org to find package names
• Writing Console.WriteLine debug statements instead of just stepping through
• Manually converting SQL to LINQ
• Waiting for Visual Studio to load when you just needed to test one thing

The paid editions pay for themselves fast. For most professional developers, Premium becomes obviously worth it within the first month.

More Than 50,000 Developers Already Know

LINQPad isn't a niche tool. Over 50,000 developers use paid editions, including engineers at 30 Fortune 100 companies and four of the world's largest banks. When senior .NET developers discover LINQPad, they tend to never go back.

The free version is exceptional. The paid versions are a superpower.

Ready to unlock the full experience? Visit linqpad.net and grab the edition that fits your workflow. Your future self—the one not waiting for builds, not hunting through documentation, not manually debugging with print statements—will thank you.

Summary

• Autocompletion (Pro+) makes exploration and learning dramatically faster
• Debugger (Developer+) provides full debugging without leaving LINQPad's instant-feedback environment
• NuGet integration (Developer+) eliminates friction when adding packages
• AI assistance (Premium) understands your schema, validates its own code, and accelerates problem-solving
• SQL-to-LINQ (Premium) converts complex queries while teaching you LINQ patterns
• 50+ code fixes (Developer+) bring Visual Studio-level refactoring to your scripts
• Cross-database queries (Premium) let you analyze data across multiple databases
• Direct table editing (Developer+) fixes data without writing UPDATE statements
• License portability — One license works on Windows, macOS, up to 3 machines + 3 VMs

The investment is small. The productivity gain is massive. And unlike most developer tools, LINQPad respects your purchase—licenses are perpetual, with free updates for minor versions.