“This project is incompatible with the current version of Visual Studio”

Question

I was getting the below message from Visual Studio 2010.

\"This project is incompatible with the current version of Visual Studio\"

Answer 1

I had this error and found it was due to the presence an 'Import' XML tag inside the .csproj.user file. Once I removed it, Visual Studio could open the project again.

Answer 2

VS 2012 has different project type support based on what you install at setup time and which edition you have. Certain options are available, e.g. web development tools, database development tools, etc. So if you're trying to open a web project but the web development tools weren't installed, it complains with this message.

This can happen if you create the project on another machine and try to open it on a new one. I figured it out trying to open an MVC project after I accidentally uninstalled the web tools.

Answer 3

In my case it was an incompatible Project Type. Editing project file and removing ProjectTypeGuids node resolved the issue of loading the project (I had already re-targeted the framework version as advised here).

Probably the project type is not supported in the (most likely) NEW version of VS, so you will have to adjust (update) the code to work properly (if possible), but at least you can see the content through VS.

Answer 4

After installing Update 3 for Visual Studio 2015, I suddenly got the "This project is incompatible with the current version of Visual Studio" error message while opening my Cordova project (.jsproj Javascript project file)

To solve this:

• Go to Programs & Features
• Select the Microsoft Visual Studio 2015 installation and click Change
• Click Modify
• Install "HTML/Javascript (Apache Cordova) Update 10" of the Cross Platform Mobile Development section

Answer 5

For me, I got this same error in VS 2015 and just installed the VS 2015 update 1, though from another answer, VS is actually up to Update 3, now (after which, they got the error and had to install .NET Core). Had issues when it hit certain packages, like the Windows SDK ones, and had to point the installer back at the paths in my original CD, and for some, even that didn't work and had to skip them and re-download from an internet-connected computer, transfer them over, and run them later manually (computer was not connected to the internet to be able to download updated versions of the packages), but after doing all that and doing a reboot, the error was gone and my project loaded fine.

Answer 6

What most people forget it is that the files of visual studio are just text files, that have some peculiars configurations that will show to the program how to open it. that is, we can change this because it's just a text in some file in there in your project folders.

Well, knowing this, what we have to do is very simple!

The first step is knowing what kind of project it is this project that stay unload. (for example: Class Library)

The Second step is create a new one (Class Library) because you know that your visual studio will create a version supported by himself. Unload this one and click in "Edit csproj".

It's in this file that we can found the configuration that tell to VS how this proj will be loaded and his name is ProjectGuid, this serial number has a variation according the type and version of project.

Now, look at your "ok project", copy the "ProjectGuid" TAG, paste on csproj that unloaded, and pay attention to the little differences and make this files almost equals, except for the tags ItemGroup that represent the references of the project.

Doing that, save all files and close your VS and open again, now your project should load normally.

I hope that this informations help somebody to understand a bit more how the VS works and help solve the problems when necessary.