File used by Microsoft Visual Studio, an IDE used for developing Windows applications; contains linker data for a compiled executable file (e.g., .EXE or .DLL); enables faster project compilation and linking, especially for larger projects.

Incremental linking files store data in such a way that localized development changes only require updates to the affected parts of a compiled and linked executable. This allows developers to make source code changes and test the results more quickly without the software having to rebuild the entire executables again. The use of ILK files may make executables slower in performance and larger in size. Therefore, developers should examine these performance metrics when building and deploying the final deliverables. NOTE: Smaller development projects may not benefit from incremental linking. To turn off incremental linking in Visual Studio, go to the Linker options in the project properties window.