Visual Studio Subscriptions administration
Set up your developer team for success. Unlock the door for your developers by granting them access to tools, cloud services, software and training resources
Why assign subscriptions
Improve developer productivity
Help your developers code faster, work smarter, and deliver high quality apps to market more efficiently with the tools and services included in their subscriptions.
Foster developer growth
Realize your org's investment
Ensure your organization gets the most value out of their investment by assigning subscriptions.
Visual Studio Subscriptions Administrator Handbook


What's included in a Visual Studio subscription?
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GitHub Enterprise
Empower your team. Transform your business.
Increase developer velocity, automate entire workflows, and redefine collaboration—all while enabling end-to-end security. Visual Studio Enterprise and Visual Studio Professional subscriptions both come with GitHub Enterprise for one great price, empowering you to accelerate innovation and ship with confidence from the world’s go-to developer platform.
Available in Enterprise Agreements for Visual Studio Professional and Enterprise subscriptions. Call your account manager or contact your regional Microsoft office to upgrade to Visual Studio subscriptions with GitHub Enterprise.
Administration videos
Using the administration portal
Tips and tricks
FAQ
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You can access the Visual Studio Subscriptions Administration Portal by connecting to https://manage.visualstudio.com and logging in with the email address that is associated with your administrator’s account. If you are not an administrator, a Super Admin on the account can add you.
The process for managing administrators varies depending on how your organization purchases its subscriptions. Use the links below to find out more:
If you are a Super Admin you can add or remove other Super Admins or Administrators. Administrators can only add or remove subscribers and will not see the Manage Administrators tab on manage.visualstudio.com.
To manage administrators:
- Select the Manage Administrators tab at the top of the page on manage.visualstudio.com
- To add select Add and type the name and email address of the person you would like to add, select the appropriate agreement from the drop down menu, select the language that they should receive their welcome email in, and select Super Admin
- To remove simply select the person you would like to remove and select Delete
Cloud subscriptions are managed by administrators who are assigned to the Azure subscription used to purchase the cloud subscriptions. The owner of the subscription is automatically assigned as the first administrator.
To assign more administrators:
- Connect to the Azure Portal at portal.azure.com.
- Sign in with the account you used to purchase the Visual Studio Cloud subscriptions.
- In the left navigation pane, scroll down to Cost Management + Billing.
- In the My subscriptions list, choose the Azure subscription that you used to make the purchase.
- Click Access control, which is located near the top of the list in the left navigation pane.
- Click the Add tab at the top of the page.
- In the fly-out pane on the right, click on the name of the subscriber you wish to make an administrator.
- Click on the Role drop-down at the top of the pane, scroll down, and select User Access Administrator.
- Click Save.
Learn more about administration of cloud subscriptions.
You can assign subscriptions to your end users one at a time, or using the Bulk Add feature to quickly and easily upload a larger number of subscribers at a time.
To assign subscriptions individually:
- Select the Manage Subscribers tab at the top of the page on manage.visualstudio.com
- Select Add and type the name and email address of the user you’d like to assign a subscription to
- If your organization is using Azure Active Directory the name field will search to find people in your current director. You can select from the search results, or add someone manually.
- If you want the subscriber to have access to software downloads when they sign into the Visual Studio Subscriptions Portal, make sure to leave the downloads toggle enabled in the Download Settings section
- Complete the Communication Preferences section so that we know what language to send your subscribers assignment email in
- If you’d like to add any notes associated with the assignment, please use the Reference selection
- Select Add at the bottom of the fly-out panel to complete your subscription assignment. Your subscriber will receive an email and can begin using their Visual Studio subscription immediately (there is no activation needed from your subscriber)
To Bulk assign subscriptions:
- Select the Manage Subscribers tab at the top of the page on manage.visualstudio.com
- Select Bulk Add, download the Excel template, and save a local copy
- All fields are required, with the exception of the Reference field
- To help ensure a smooth upload, observe the following best practices:
- Ensure that none of the form fields contain commas.
- Remove spaces before and after form fields.
- Ensure names do not contain extra spaces between two-part first or last names (for example, if a person has a two-part first name such as “Maggie May”, it should be typed as “MaggieMay)
- To help ensure a smooth upload, observe the following best practices:
- Return to manage.visualstudio.com, select Bulk Add, and upload your saved copy of the Excel template
- When the upload is successful you will see a confirmation page, and your subscriber list populated with your new subscribers. Your subscribers will receive an email and can begin using their Visual Studio subscription immediately (there is no activation needed from your subscribers)
Read more information about assigning subscriptions in the Visual Studio Subscriptions Administrator portal to learn more about quickly and easily assigning subscriptions
If you are an MPN customer:
Partners who earn a competency or who purchase the Action Pack in MPN are eligible to use Visual Studio subscriptions. These subscriptions are licensed per user and are only valid when assigned to a specific named user who works for the partner company. Subscriptions should be assigned using the Partner Membership Center. Learn how to manage Visual Studio subscriptions offered through the Microsoft Partner Network (MPN), or see Visual Studio subscriptions offered to partners in the Microsoft Partner Network (MPN) for details.
Cloud subscriptions are managed by administrators who are assigned to the Azure subscription used to purchase the cloud subscriptions. The owner of the subscription is automatically assigned as the first administrator.
To assign more administrators:
- Connect to the Azure Portal at portal.azure.com.
- Sign in with the account you used to purchase the Visual Studio Cloud subscriptions.
- In the left navigation pane, scroll down to Cost Management + Billing.
- In the My subscriptions list, choose the Azure subscription that you used to make the purchase.
- Click Access control, which is located near the top of the list in the left navigation pane.
- Click the Add tab at the top of the page.
- In the fly-out pane on the right, click on the name of the subscriber you wish to make an administrator.
- Click on the Role drop-down at the top of the pane, scroll down, and select User Access Administrator.
- Click Save.
Learn more about administration of cloud subscriptions.
You can export your subscribers from your previous agreement and add them to your new agreement using the Bulk Add button. Note: your subscribers will receive an email when the new subscription is assigned to them. Learn more about exporting subscribers and using the Bulk Add feature.
If you have more than 200 subscribers on your previous agreement our support team can assist you. Select “Account, Subscription, and Billing Support” and select your country. Depending on your location, support may be available via email, chat, or phone.
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If your organization has an Enterprise Agreement for Azure, your developers can choose between the $50-$150 Azure individual dev/test credits or 50% off dev/test pricing. They cannot use both on the same subscription. For details on how to enable the dev/test pricing option for your developers, check out the video entitled “Help your subscribers get the most out of Azure”.
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A Microsoft Account (MSA) is a personal email account owned by an individual to access Microsoft services when an organization is not using a managed tenant for Office 365 or Azure Active Directory. A work account is one owned by the organization that issues it and is used to access services on Office 365 or Azure Active Directory tenants. For complete information about the differences between MSAs and work accounts, check out the “Learn about the differences in using MSAs (Microsoft Accounts) vs. Work Accounts (Azure Active Directory or Office 365) and how this may impact your organization“.
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The process for renewing subscriptions depends on how they were purchased.
Retail: For subscriptions acquired through the Microsoft Store, connect to the Microsoft Store’s business software section, and scroll down to the Visual Studio section to see the available subscriptions. Be sure to select the renewal subscription level and activate it here: https://my.visualstudio.com/subscriptions/activate.
Cloud subscriptions: If you’re using cloud subscriptions, you don’t need to renew them. They renew automatically until you cancel them. Learn more about buying cloud subscriptions.
Volume Licensing: To renew subscriptions purchased through Volume Licensing, please contact your reseller. Find a reseller in your area.
When you cancel a Visual Studio cloud subscription, you are canceling automatic renewal. The subscription continues until its normal renewal date and then simply expires. At expiration, the Visual Studio subscriber can no longer use Visual Studio or any other benefits from the subscription.
With monthly cloud subscriptions, cancellations take effect the first day of the next month. If you only cancel some of your monthly cloud subscriptions, be sure to remove users on the first of the next month to ensure that the correct people continue to have active subscriptions assigned.
For annual cloud subscriptions, cancellations take effect the first day of the month following 12 months from the original purchase, or 12 months from the last annual renewal charge. For instance, if you bought a Visual Studio Professional annual cloud subscription on January 3, 2018 then it remains active until February 1, 2019 when it automatically renews for another year. If you cancel at any time between then and February 1, 2020 then the subscription will expire on February 1, 2020. There is no rebate for canceling part way through the subscription year with annual cloud subscriptions.
See our How charges are processed topic for additional information about cloud subscriptions.
See our Cancel renewals of cloud subscriptions you’ve purchased topic for more information.
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News and links for administrators
Move to Visual Studio subscriptions with GitHub Enterprise
If your organization recently renewed into Visual Studio subscriptions with GitHub Enterprise, there’s an easy way to move all of your existing users to the new subscriptions without resetting their benefits.
Azure Active Directory groups
Organizations that have the ability to overclaim subscriptions can use Azure AD groups to automatically assign subscriptions.
Administrator Documentation
Have more questions about being an administrator or managing subscriptions? Check out our docs.