Uninstalling Xamarin

• 04/08/2017
• 7 minutes to read
• Contributors
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This guide explains how to remove Xamarin from macOS or from Visual Studio on Windows.

If it is necessary to reinstall Xamarin using the Universal Installer, it is always recommended that the computer is rebooted first.

Uninstalling Xamarin on macOS

This guide can be used to uninstall each product individually by navigating to the relevant section. The entire Xamarin toolset, which includes the listed products, can be uninstalled by following this guide the whole way through:

• Mono
• Xamarin.Android
• Xamarin.iOS
• Xamarin.Mac
• Inspector and Workbooks
• Xamarin Profiler
• Installer

Uninstalling Visual Studio for Mac

The first step in uninstalling Xamarin from a Mac is to locate Visual Studio.app in the /Applications directory and drag it to the Trash Can. Alternatively, right-click and select Move to Trash as illustrated in the following image:

Deleting this app bundle removes Visual Studio for Mac, although there may be other files relating to Xamarin still on a file system.

To remove all traces of Visual Studio for Mac, run the following commands in Terminal:

sudo rm -rf "/Applications/Visual Studio.app"
rm -rf ~/Library/Caches/VisualStudio
rm -rf ~/Library/Preferences/VisualStudio
rm -rf ~/Library/Preferences/Visual\ Studio
rm -rf ~/Library/Logs/VisualStudio
rm -rf ~/Library/VisualStudio
rm -rf ~/Library/Preferences/Xamarin/
rm -rf ~/Library/Developer/Xamarin
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/VisualStudio
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/VisualStudio/7.0/LocalInstall/Addins/

Uninstall Mono SDK (MDK)

Mono is an open-source implementation of the .NET Framework and is used by all Xamarin Products—Xamarin.iOS, Xamarin.Android, and Xamarin.Mac to allow development of these platforms in C#.

To remove the Mono Framework, run the following commands in Terminal:

sudo rm -rf /Library/Frameworks/Mono.framework
sudo pkgutil --forget com.xamarin.mono-MDK.pkg
sudo rm /etc/paths.d/mono-commands

Uninstall Xamarin.Android

There are a number of items that are required when using Xamarin.Android, such as the Android SDK and Java SDK, which need to be removed when uninstalling Xamarin.Android. This section will guide you through uninstalling all the necessary parts.

To remove Xamarin.Android, run the following commands in Terminal:

sudo rm -rf /Developer/MonoDroid
rm -rf ~/Library/MonoAndroid
sudo pkgutil --forget com.xamarin.android.pkg
sudo rm -rf /Library/Frameworks/Xamarin.Android.framework

Uninstall Android SDK and Java SDK

The Android SDK is required for development of Android applications. To completely remove all parts of the Android SDK, locate the file at ~/Library/Developer/Xamarin/ and move it to Trash.

The Java SDK (JDK) does not need to be uninstalled, as it is already pre packaged as part of Mac OS X.

Uninstall Android AVD

To remove any Android AVDs and additional Android components, use the following command:

rm -rf ~/.android

To remove only the Android AVDs, use the following command:

rm -rf ~/.android/avd

Uninstall Xamarin.iOS

Xamarin.iOS allows iOS application development using C# or F#. To uninstall Xamarin.iOS from a machine, follow the steps below:

To remove all Xamarin.iOS files, use the following commands in Terminal :

rm -rf ~/Library/MonoTouch
sudo rm -rf /Library/Frameworks/Xamarin.iOS.framework
sudo rm -rf /Developer/MonoTouch
sudo pkgutil --forget com.xamarin.monotouch.pkg
sudo pkgutil --forget com.xamarin.xamarin-ios-build-host.pkg
sudo pkgutil --forget com.xamarin.xamarin.ios.pkg

Uninstall Xamarin.Mac

Xamarin.Mac can be removed from your machine by using the following two commands to eradicate the product and license from your Mac respectively:

sudo rm -rf /Library/Frameworks/Xamarin.Mac.framework
rm -rf ~/Library/Xamarin.Mac

Uninstall Workbooks and Inspector

To remove Xamarin Inspector and Workbooks version 1.2.2 and above, use the following commands in Terminal:

sudo /Library/Frameworks/Xamarin.Interactive.framework/Versions/Current/uninstall

For earlier versions, see the Workbooks uninstall guide.

Uninstall the Xamarin Profiler

To remove the Xamarin Profiler, use the following commands in Terminal:

sudo rm -rf "/Applications/Xamarin Profiler.app"

Uninstall the Xamarin Installer

To remove all traces of the Xamarin Universal Installer, use the following commands:

rm -rf ~/Library/Caches/XamarinInstaller/
rm -rf ~/Library/Caches/VisualStudioInstaller/
rm -rf ~/Library/Logs/XamarinInstaller/
rm -rf ~/Library/Logs/VisualStudioInstaller/
rm -rf ~/Library/Preferences/Xamarin/
rm -rf "~/Library/Preferences/Visual Studio/"

Using the Uninstall Script

This uninstall script allows you to uninstall Visual Studio for Mac and its associated Xamarin components in one go.

The script contains most of the commands that are found in the article. There are two main omissions from the script and are not included due to possible external dependencies:

• Uninstalling Mono
• Uninstalling Android AVD

To run the script, do the following steps:

1. Right-click on the script and select Save As… to save the file on your Mac.

2. Open Terminal and change the working directory to where the script was downloaded:

   $ cd /location/of/file
   

3. Make the script executable and the run it with sudo:

    $ chmod +x ./xamarin_uninstall.sh
    $ sudo ./xamarin_uninstall.sh
   

4. Finally, delete the uninstall script.

At this point, Xamarin should be uninstalled from your computer.

Uninstalling Xamarin on Windows

Xamarin has been supported on the following:

• Visual Studio 2017
• Visual Studio 2015
• Visual Studio 2013 [Unsupported]
• Xamarin Studio [Unsupported]

Visual Studio 2017

Xamarin is uninstalled from Visual Studio 2017 using the installer app:

1. Use the Start menu to open the Visual Studio Installer.

2. Press the Modify button for the instance you wish to change.

   

3. In the Workloads tab, de-select the Mobile Development with .NET option (in the Mobile & Gaming section).

   

4. Click the Modify button in the bottom right of the window.

5. The installer will remove the de-selected components (Visual Studio 2017 must be closed before the installer can make any changes).

   

Individual Xamarin components (such as the Profiler or Workbooks) can be uninstalled by switching to the Individual Components tab in step 3, and unchecking specific components:

To uninstall Visual Studio 2017 completely, choose Uninstall from the three-bar menu next to the Launch button.

Uninstalling older and unsupported products

Visual Studio 2015 and earlier

To uninstall Visual Studio 2015 completely, use the support answer on visualstudio.com.

Xamarin can be uninstalled from a Windows machine through Control Panel. Navigate to Programs and Features or Programs > Uninstall a Program as illustrated below:

From the Control Panel, uninstall any of the following that are present:

• Xamarin
• Xamarin for Windows
• Xamarin.Android
• Xamarin.iOS
• Xamarin for Visual Studio

In Explorer, delete any remaining files from the Xamarin Visual Studio extension folders (all versions, including both Program Files and Program Files (x86)):

C:\Program Files*\Microsoft Visual Studio 1*.0\Common7\IDE\Extensions\Xamarin

Delete Visual Studio's MEF component cache directory, which should be located in the following location:

%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\VisualStudio\1*.0\ComponentModelCache

Check in the VirtualStore directory to see if Windows might have stored any overlay files for the Extensions\Xamarin or ComponentModelCache directories there:

%LOCALAPPDATA%\VirtualStore

Open the registry editor (regedit) and look for the following key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SharedDlls

Find and delete any entries that match this pattern:

C:\Program Files*\Microsoft Visual Studio 1*.0\Common7\IDE\Extensions\Xamarin

Look for this key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\1*.0\ExtensionManager\PendingDeletions

Delete any entries that look like they might be related to Xamarin. For example, anything containing the terms mono or xamarin.

Open an administrator cmd.exe command prompt, and then run the devenv /setup and devenv /updateconfiguration commands for each installed version of Visual Studio. For example, for Visual Studio 2015:

"%ProgramFiles(x86)%\Microsoft Visual Studio 14.0\Common7\IDE\devenv.exe" /setup
"%ProgramFiles(x86)%\Microsoft Visual Studio 14.0\Common7\IDE\devenv.exe" /updateconfiguration

Uninstall Xamarin Studio on Windows

Xamarin Studio is uninstalled from a Windows machine through Control Panel. Navigate to Programs and Features or Programs > Uninstall a Program

To uninstall Xamarin Studio, find Xamarin Studio 5.x.x in the list of programs and click the Uninstall button.

Uninstall Xamarin Studio on Mac

The first step in uninstalling Xamarin Studio from a Mac is to locate Xamarin Studio.app in the /Applications directory and drag it to the Trash Can. Alternatively, right-click and select Move to Trash as illustrated below:

Deleting this app bundle will remove Xamarin Studio, however, there are other files relating to Xamarin still on a file system.

To remove all traces of Xamarin Studio, the following commands should be run in Terminal:

sudo rm -rf "/Applications/Xamarin Studio.app"
rm -rf ~/Library/Caches/XamarinStudio-*
rm -rf ~/Library/Preferences/XamarinStudio-*
rm -rf ~/Library/Logs/XamarinStudio-*
rm -rf ~/Library/XamarinStudio-*

Summary

This article provided instruction on uninstalling Xamarin completely from a Mac through the use of Terminal commands. It also provided instruction on uninstalling Xamarin from a Windows machine through the Programs and Features option (for Visual Studio 2015 and earlier), and using the Visual Studio Installer for Visual Studio 2017.

Related Links

• Uninstall Script (sample)