Visual Studio 2022 #Include Intellisense Not Working Correctly, Requires <> rather than ""

[KromTheImpaler]

Hi all, hoping there’s someone well versed in Visual Studio who can help. The gist is, in my C++ projects in Visual Studio, when I go to use include and I type a " afterwards, intellisense does not pop up with any files/directories from my project directory. It is also missing engine headers like DrawDebugShapes.h, Actor.h, etc. However, if I type < then suddenly those files are showing again. To make matters more bizarre, my laptop which is nearly identical to my desktop (Windows 11, VS 2022, UE 5.3.2, all updated to the latest), works per usual. Interestingly, even if I use the “” format and intellisense puts a red squiggle under the include, it builds just fine

This sent me on a hunt to try to fix it, but I’ve hit a roadblock.

What I do notice when I look at the VC++Directories (right clicking on the project part of the solution and selecting properties) is the following. On my desktop where things aren’t working I see the following lines that are not in my include directories on the laptop:

..\Build\Win64\UnrealEditor\Inc\VSTest\UHT;
..\Build\Win64\UnrealEditor\Inc\VSTest\VNI;
..\..\Source;
..\..\Source\VSTest\Private;
..\..\Source\VSTest\Public;

My laptop does not have these in the include path. I think this is why the Angle Brackets will find my directory.

The laptop has additional include directories that are not in the desktop:

C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Shaders\Shared;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\AnimationDataController\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\AssetTools\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\AutomationController\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\CollectionManager\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\DesktopPlatform\Internal;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\DesktopPlatform\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\DeveloperToolSettings\Classes;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\DeveloperToolSettings\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\DirectoryWatcher\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\FunctionalTesting\Classes;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\FunctionalTesting\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\Horde\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\Localization\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\MaterialUtilities\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\Merge\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\MeshBuilder\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\MeshMergeUtilities\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\MeshReductionInterface\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\MeshUtilities\Public;
C:\Dev\UE_5.3\Engine\Source\Developer\PhysicsUtilities\Public;

Here’s what I’ve done so far to troubleshoot:

1. Deleted all my intermediates/saved/Binaries/DerivedDataCache/.vsconfig/.sln file/.vs directory numerous times and regenerated visual studio files after every change
2. reinstalled UE5.3.2
3. reinstalled Visual Studio 2022
4. tried UE4.27.2 (same issue, works fine on the laptop, broken on the desktop)
5. installed the visual studio integration plugin from the UE marketplace
6. installed the visual studio integration from the VS Installer
7. installed the visual studio integration from the UE_5.3/Engine/Extras/UnrealVS/VS2022/UnrealVS.vsix file
8. Tried deleting the include paths that were extra on my desktop and then adding the include paths that were missing (ensuring that the directories to the engine were all correct). This did not work, and the project would also not build saying it could not find the files

The include paths for NMAKE and the external directories are all the same, as are all the myriad of additional include directories in the internal include path.

I’m at a loss where to go next. It seems that somehow there’s a configuration either in unreal or visual studio 2022 that configures the include paths in a different way on my desktop than my laptop. This configuration flag or setting seems to persist despite full uninstall of both visual studio 2022 and unreal engine. Could it be a registry setting somewhere? Stored somewhere in my AppData directory that I cannot locate?

I see others have this issue as well, so I know it’s not just my computer. At least one post was also from the 4.x era. I do not wish to reinstall windows 11 just to try to solve this which would be the last thing I can think of to fix it.

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#include with quotes does not work, with angle brackets works (visual studio 2022 intellisense)

i have same issue it’s make me crazy somebody help!

[3dRaven]

I’ve noticed that intelisense seems to work better if you have private and public directories in your source. Private for the cpp files and Public for headers. (project files ofc)

Also make sure that if you are accessing files beyond core and engine that the correct modules are included inside of your build file.

[KromTheImpaler]

Hi there, thanks for the reply! This will happen regardless of the project/addons. The project above was a simple empty C++ test project, no modules or anything. The only class I added was indeed a public class with the button clicked called “Item” that inherited from Actor. All new projects have this issue. The VC++ Include Directories that are being built right from the start of the project are somehow different.