Visual Studio Installer Files: Installing into ProgramData

The Visual Studio Installer project type gives you a ready-made “User’s Desktop” special folder in its File System editor, but there’s no equivalent shortcut for the hidden ProgramData folder — you have to build it yourself using a Custom Folder.

Steps

1. In your Installer project, right-click File System on Target Machine and choose Add Special Folder > Custom Folder.
2. This creates a folder named Custom Folder #1 — right-click it and choose Rename.
3. Rename it to ProgramData (this is just a label at this point; it doesn’t yet point anywhere).
4. Select the folder and open its Properties window.
5. Change the DefaultLocation property from [TARGETDIR] to:

[CommonAppDataFolder]

Once DefaultLocation is set correctly, add whatever files or subfolders you need into this folder within the installer project, and they’ll be installed into the real ProgramData folder on the target machine — this is the standard location for machine-wide application data that all users should be able to read, as opposed to per-user AppData.

Do You Still Have the Installer Project Type? (Updated for 2026)

This trips people up on newer Visual Studio installs: the classic Visual Studio Installer project type used in this guide hasn’t shipped as a built-in project template since Visual Studio 2015. If you don’t see it in File > New > Project, that’s why — it isn’t missing from your install, it was never installed in the first place. It’s still available, just as a separate, free download from the Visual Studio Marketplace: search for “Microsoft Visual Studio Installer Projects 2022” and install it as an extension (Extensions > Manage Extensions), or download it directly from the Marketplace and close Visual Studio while it installs. Once installed, the project type and the File System editor referenced above appear exactly as they always have. If you’re running the newest Visual Studio release, be aware there have been reports in community threads of compatibility hiccups getting the Installer Projects extension working correctly on the latest major version — if you hit issues there, opening the same project in a Visual Studio 2022 install (which has broader, more mature support for the extension) is the more reliable path while that catches up. For new projects going forward, Microsoft’s own guidance points toward WiX, the MSIX Packaging Tool, or other modern packaging tools as the actively developed alternatives — but for maintaining an existing Installer Projects-based setup like the one in this guide, the extension above remains the straightforward way to keep it working.

Resources

• Visual Studio
• Visual Studio Installer
• MSI
• guide