Install nuget with Homebrew, dnf, Nix, pacman, scoop, winget

Project links

• Homepage
• Repository
• Upstream docs
• Package manager page

Commands and aliases

• nuget

Project history

The project began in 2010 as NuPack in the ASP.NET / Microsoft web tooling orbit. Phil Haack's October 6, 2010 announcement described it as an open source, developer-focused package manager for simplifying third-party library use in .NET applications, and said the Outercurve Foundation had accepted the project into the ASP.NET Open Source Gallery.

The NuPack name was quickly changed. Haack's October 21, 2010 post opened public voting on replacement names, and his October 29, 2010 follow-up announced NuGet as the winner. That rename is part of NuGet lore because it tied the package manager's identity to community input before the project settled into the .NET platform.

Adoption history

NuGet solved a very visible .NET pain point: finding libraries, adding assembly references, putting files in predictable project locations, applying config transforms, and updating dependencies. A November 2011 MSDN Magazine article presented NuGet as the rescue path from manual library download and reference management, and noted that ASP.NET MVC 3 already included it.

NuGet's adoption is structural rather than just CLI popularity. Microsoft Learn describes NuGet packages as .nupkg zip files carrying compiled code, related files, and manifest metadata; package authors publish them to public or private hosts, while consumers add them to projects and call the package functionality from application code. NuGet.org is the central public repository for that workflow.

Homebrew packages the standalone `nuget` command for macOS/Linux users outside Visual Studio. The Homebrew formula showed stable version 7.6.0 and 26,865 installs over the 365-day analytics window visible on July 1, 2026.

How it is used

Package nerds use NuGet in three overlapping ways: `nuget.exe` for pack/push/restore workflows, Visual Studio's package manager UI and console for project work, and modern SDK/MSBuild restore paths for repeatable CI. The important artifact is the `.nupkg`, whose ID, semantic version, dependencies, target framework assets, metadata, and source repository fields become part of the .NET dependency graph.

Practical usage is not only installing public packages. Organizations run private NuGet feeds for internal libraries, mirror/cache packages for build reproducibility, pin or float versions through project files and lock files, and publish prerelease packages from CI before promoting stable versions to nuget.org or an internal feed.

Why package nerds care

NuGet is infrastructure for the .NET supply chain. It defines the default package unit, public distribution hub, and restore semantics for a large share of .NET application builds, which makes it comparable in ecosystem role to npm for JavaScript or PyPI/pip for Python.

Timeline

• 2010-10-06: NuPack/NuGet announced as an open source .NET package manager accepted by the Outercurve Foundation into the ASP.NET Open Source Gallery.
• 2010-10-21: NuPack rename vote opened.
• 2010-10-29: NuGet announced as the selected name.
• 2011-11: MSDN Magazine documented NuGet's package-install, update, and PowerShell-console workflows for Visual Studio users.

Related projects

• NuGet Gallery
• NuGet.Client
• NuGet/Home
• .NET SDK restore
• MSBuild

Sources

• https://formulae.brew.sh/formula/nuget
• https://haacked.com/archive/2010/10/06/introducing-nupack-package-manager.aspx/
• https://haacked.com/archive/2010/10/21/renaming-nupack.aspx/
• https://haacked.com/archive/2010/10/29/nupack-is-now-nuget.aspx/
• https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/archive/msdn-magazine/2011/november/nuget-manage-project-libraries-with-nuget
• https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/nuget/what-is-nuget
• https://www.nuget.org/