Alternative Overview of the SSMSBoost Add-in for SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)

Code completion is a popular and valuable technique for programmers who want to write clear, accurate, and reliable code without spending too much time.

Usually, code completion helps save time on day-to-day coding tasks by providing contextual suggestions for code in the SQL editor. Thus, you can focus on what you do best instead of typing.

There are lots of code completion tools out there. Today we will do a short review and features comparison of dbForge SQL Complete and SSMSBoost. All this will help you decide what the best completion tool is.

Overview of the SSMSBoost Add-in for SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)

Developers of the SSMSBoost call it an add-in for SSMS with extended SSMS features. They pitch it as a tool to help developers perform daily tasks and avoid loss in their code. This software makes it easy to manage your preferred server connections, switch between your preferred and recent connections, set up connection colors for each connection, create alert messages for essential connections, etc.

SSMSBoost simplifies the work with SQL objects, such as the ‘Go to Definition’ feature, object scripting, object name management, and object location in Object Explorer. Autoreplacements let developers accelerate commands or snippets that they input. This tool supports all versions of SSMS, such as 18, 17, 2016, 2014, 2012, and 2008 SP2.

Overview of the dbForge SQL Complete add-in for SSMS

When considering alternatives to SSMS, dbForge SQL Complete may be the most valuable and functional. And this is not surprising because it is a full-featured and advanced IntelliSense-style SQL autocompletion add-in for Visual Studio and .

Code refactoring, completion, and SQL formatting opportunities help write stable and error-free SQL code faster. This allows them to augment their productivity leaps and bounds better.

dbForge SQL Complete offers many valuable features, including context-based code completion, object suggestions, code refactoring, SQL snippets, grid aggregates, history execution, navigation between blocks, etc. The object and variable renaming capabilities can greatly improve the code readability. SQL developers can use various formatting options to format the code as desired.

Below, you'll see a comparison of the features each tool (dbForge SQL Complete v6.12 and SSMSBoost v3.12) provides. It will help you decide what tools to choose to reach your goals.

Feature	dbForge SQL Complete	SSMSBoost
Compatibility
SQL Server support	2000-2022	2000-2019
Azure SQL support	Yes	Yes
SSMS integration	Yes	Yes
Visual Studio integration	Yes	No
Improve code quality
Find invalid objects	Yes	No
Generate CRUD	Yes	No
Generate the CREATE/ALTER script for server objects	Yes	Yes
Renaming objects, variables, and aliases	Yes	No
T-SQL Debugger	Yes	No
Work safe with document environment and database
Various options for executing statements	Yes	No
Execution warnings	Yes	Yes
Execution notifications	Yes	Yes
Transaction Reminder	Yes	Yes
Tabs coloring	Yes	Yes
Custom SSMS main window title	Yes	Yes
Execution history of SQL statements	Yes	Yes
Important Database alert	No	Yes
Tabs management	Yes	Yes
Quick Connection Switch	No	Yes
Documents sessions	Yes	Yes
Recently closed documents	Yes	No
Operate with data in SSMS data grid
Results Grid Data Visualizers	Yes	Yes
Copy Data As from SSMS grid to XML, CSV, HTML, JSON, Excel	Yes	Yes
Copy Data As from SSMS grid to File	Yes	No
Copy Results Grid Headers (Column Names + Types)	Yes	Yes
Find Columns in Results Grid	No	Yes
Grid Aggregates	Yes	Yes
Find in Results Grid	Yes	Yes
Generate Script As from SSMS data grid	Yes	Yes
Boost coding productivity
Context-sensitive suggestion of objects names and keywords	Yes	No
Object information	Yes	No
Parameter information	Yes	No
SQL snippets	Yes	Yes
“Go to definition” for database objects	Yes	Yes
Highlight occurrences of an identifier	Yes	No
Highlight BEGIN/END and CASE/END	Yes	Yes
Highlight BEGIN TRY/END TRY and BEGIN CATCH/END CATCH	Yes	No
Highlight COLUMNS and VALUES in an INSERT statement	Yes	Yes
Navigation between queries	Yes	No
Navigation between brackets	Yes	Yes
Named regions	Yes	Yes
Vertical guidelines	No	Yes
Navigation between COLUMNS and VALUES in an INSERT statement	Yes	Yes
Navigation between BEGIN TRY/END TRY and BEGIN CATCH/END CATCH	Yes	No
Navigation between BEGIN/END and CASE/END	Yes	Yes
SQL Editor contents history	No	Yes
Document Outline window	Yes	No
Unify SQL standards
SQL formatting	Yes	Yes
Multiple predefined formatting profiles	Yes	No
Keeping original format for a piece of code	Yes	Yes
Formatting Profile Quick Select	Yes	No
Command-line interface	Yes	No
Settings
Import/Export Settings Wizard	Yes	No
Manage keyboard shortcuts	No	Yes
Quick search for options	Yes	Yes
Releases
The very first release	v1.0 (Nov 19, 2010)	v2.1 (Apr 20, 2012)
The latest release (at the time of publication)	v6.12 (Sep 12, 2022)	v3.12 (Apr 7, 2021)
Total release quantity	133	32

Price comparison

Users can download the trial version of both dbForge SQL Complete and SSMSBoost and use them for free for 14 days to evaluate their features, which might be useful for your work. Once the expiration date passes, the user can purchase a full version.

dbForge SQL Complete offers three editions: a free Express edition, a Standard ($199.95), and a Professional ($249.95). In SSMSBoost, you'll find a free community edition and a professional license at $195. The price differences are minor, but dbForge SQL Complete provides more features.

Conclusion

People weigh all pros and cons when choosing one of the code completion tools. Users analyze the tools' features, compare prices, and find the right tool. This article is designed to simplify your selection. SQL Server Management Studio is an excellent alternative to SSMS that allows you to code faster without typos and not waste time on syntax checks.

To check out its features, you can download a 14-day trial version of dbForge . After that, you will have a completely different SQL coding experience and no longer want to work without dbForge SQL Complete.