The SharePoint Development Experience: A Special Kind of Pain
Let's be honest—if you've worked with SharePoint for more than a week, you've probably had that moment. You know the one. Where you're staring at a screen, wondering how something that's supposed to make collaboration easier can feel so fundamentally broken at the developer level. I've been there. I've lost hours—days, really—to SharePoint's particular brand of development hell.
The original poster on that Reddit thread wasn't exaggerating. They called it "therapy" to write about their SharePoint experience, and honestly? I get it. There's something cathartic about naming the specific ways this platform makes our lives difficult. And in 2026, despite Microsoft's continued investment, many of these pain points persist.
This isn't just about complaining, though. It's about understanding why SharePoint development feels so fundamentally different—and often worse—than working with other enterprise platforms. It's about the real costs of those decisions, the hidden complexities, and what you can actually do about it.
The Performance Problem: When Thousands Feel Like Millions
Remember that line from the original post about performance falling over at numbers a proper database would laugh at? That's not hyperbole. I've seen SharePoint lists with 5,000 items bring entire workflows to their knees. In 2026, with modern databases handling millions of transactions per second, SharePoint's performance limitations feel almost quaint.
Here's what's happening under the hood. SharePoint uses a combination of SQL Server and its own proprietary storage mechanisms. But the abstraction layers between your data and the actual database create bottlenecks that wouldn't exist if you were working directly with SQL. Views that should be instantaneous take seconds. Filter operations that would be trivial in a proper database require careful optimization and often still disappoint.
And don't get me started on the infamous list view threshold. Microsoft increased it over the years, but the fundamental problem remains: SharePoint imposes artificial limits on how much data you can work with efficiently. When you hit those limits, you're not just dealing with slow performance—you're dealing with outright failures. Queries time out. Operations fail silently. Users get confused error messages.
The real kicker? These performance issues aren't linear. A list with 4,900 items might work fine. Add 101 more items, and suddenly everything breaks. It's like hitting an invisible wall that wasn't on any of the architectural diagrams.
Architecture by Committee: The Design Decisions That Haunt Us
"Designed by committee during a fire drill." That phrase from the original post has stuck with me because it perfectly captures the feeling of working with SharePoint's architecture. There's a sense that different parts of the system were built by different teams with different priorities, and nobody quite managed to make them work together seamlessly.
Take the API landscape, for example. In 2026, we have:
- The classic SharePoint SOAP web services (still there, still clunky)
- The Client Side Object Model (CSOM)
- REST APIs (multiple versions with different capabilities)
- Microsoft Graph API (which sometimes talks to SharePoint, sometimes doesn't)
- PowerShell modules (each with their own quirks)
Each of these has different authentication methods, different rate limits, different error handling, and different capabilities. Want to update a document's metadata? Depending on your scenario, you might use three different APIs for what should be one simple operation.
The permission system deserves its own special mention. SharePoint's security model is incredibly granular—you can control access at the site, list, folder, and item level. That sounds powerful until you try to implement it. Inheritance breaks in confusing ways. Unique permissions create performance nightmares. And trying to audit who has access to what? Good luck.
It feels like the architecture was designed to check boxes on a feature list rather than to create a coherent developer experience. Every new feature seems to add complexity without simplifying the existing mess.
The Development Experience: Where Good Tools Go to Die
Modern development in 2026 is about smooth workflows, good tooling, and fast feedback loops. SharePoint development often feels like it's actively fighting against all of these principles.
First, there's the deployment story. Want to deploy a custom web part? You're probably looking at SharePoint Framework (SPFx), which is actually not terrible—it's built on modern web technologies. But then you hit the deployment pipeline. Packaging solutions, app catalogs, tenant-wide deployment versus site collection deployment, versioning headaches... it's a maze of configuration and ceremony.
Debugging is its own special kind of pain. Error messages are often cryptic at best. "Something went wrong" isn't just a meme—it's a real error message you'll encounter. Stack traces point to internal Microsoft code you can't see. And because SharePoint runs in a complex environment with multiple layers of caching, reproducing issues can be maddening.
Then there's the testing problem. How do you properly test SharePoint solutions? Unit testing business logic is straightforward enough, but integration testing requires a real SharePoint environment. And performance testing? You need production-like data volumes, which means either generating thousands of test items (and dealing with those performance limits) or testing in production (which everyone knows is a bad idea).
The tooling feels bolted on rather than integrated. Visual Studio Code extensions help, but they're working around SharePoint's limitations rather than with SharePoint's strengths.
Integration Nightmares: When SharePoint Meets the Real World
Here's where the rubber really meets the road. In 2026, no application exists in isolation. Your SharePoint solution needs to talk to CRM systems, ERP platforms, custom databases, third-party APIs, and legacy systems. And this is where SharePoint's integration story gets particularly painful.
The authentication dance alone could drive a developer to drink. You've got NTLM, Kerberos, OAuth, Azure AD, and sometimes all of them at once. Want to call a SharePoint API from a server-side application? You'll need to navigate app-only permissions, certificate-based authentication, and the Azure AD app registration portal. And heaven help you if you need to access SharePoint from outside your corporate network.
Data synchronization is another common pain point. Say you need to keep user information in SharePoint synchronized with your HR system. You'll quickly discover that SharePoint's user profile service has its own ideas about how data should be structured. Field mappings break. Synchronization schedules conflict. And when something goes wrong, you're comparing GUIDs across three different systems trying to figure out where the mismatch happened.
Event receivers and webhooks should make integration easier, but they come with their own limitations. Timeouts, retry logic that doesn't retry, payload size limits—each integration point becomes a potential failure point that needs careful handling.
And let's talk about the elephant in the room: Microsoft's own ecosystem. Even integrating with other Microsoft products can be surprisingly difficult. Dynamics 365 to SharePoint? Power Automate flows that break when you look at them wrong? Teams integration that works perfectly in development but fails in production? These aren't edge cases—they're Tuesday.
Practical Survival Tips: Getting Work Done Despite SharePoint
Okay, enough complaining. You probably have to work with SharePoint. Maybe your company is invested in it. Maybe you're maintaining legacy solutions. Maybe you just need to get this project done so you can move on to something better. Here's how to survive.
First, embrace the SharePoint Framework (SPFx) for new development. It's not perfect, but it's the most modern approach Microsoft offers. It uses TypeScript, React, and webpack—tools that actual web developers use. The learning curve is real, but at least you're learning transferable skills.
Second, treat SharePoint as a presentation layer, not a data layer. This is crucial. Use SharePoint for what it's good at—document management, basic lists, collaboration features. But for serious data? Keep it in a proper database and use SharePoint to display it. Create read-only views that pull from your real data store. Your performance problems will decrease dramatically.
Third, implement aggressive caching. SharePoint's own caching is... let's call it "idiosyncratic." Implement your own caching layer for data that doesn't change often. Use CDN for static resources. Cache API responses. Every request you don't have to make to SharePoint is a request that won't fail or timeout.
Fourth, automate your deployments. Seriously. Manual deployment to SharePoint is asking for trouble. Use Azure DevOps, GitHub Actions, or whatever CI/CD pipeline you prefer. Script everything. Test the deployment process itself. The less you touch SharePoint directly during deployment, the better.
Finally, know when to push back. If a requirement is going to be particularly painful in SharePoint, say so. Provide alternatives. Estimate honestly (then double it). Sometimes the business doesn't understand the technical debt they're asking you to incur.
Common Mistakes (And How to Avoid Them)
I've made most of these mistakes myself, so learn from my pain.
Don't create deeply nested folder structures in document libraries. SharePoint handles this poorly from both a performance and usability perspective. Use metadata and views instead. Yes, users love folders because they're familiar, but they'll thank you later when search actually works.
Don't enable versioning on every list and library without thinking about it. Versioning is great until you have 50 versions of every document and your storage quota is screaming. Implement retention policies. Clean up old versions automatically.
Don't create custom content types for every little variation. Content type proliferation is a real problem that makes migration and maintenance painful. Be conservative. Use site columns judiciously.
Don't ignore permission inheritance. Breaking inheritance seems like a good idea until you're trying to figure out why someone can't access a document. Document your security model. Audit permissions regularly. Consider using SharePoint groups even when it feels like overkill.
And for the love of all that's holy, don't try to use SharePoint as a relational database. I know it has lookup columns. I know you can create relationships. Resist the temptation. When you need relational data, use a relational database.
The Future: Is There Hope for SharePoint Development?
Looking ahead to 2026 and beyond, where does SharePoint development go? Microsoft continues to invest, but the fundamental tension remains: SharePoint needs to serve both end-users (who want simplicity) and developers (who need power and flexibility).
The move toward Microsoft Graph is promising. A unified API for all Microsoft 365 services could simplify integration dramatically. But Graph adoption has been slow, and it doesn't cover all SharePoint scenarios yet. The documentation is improving, but it's still a patchwork of different quality levels.
Power Platform integration offers another path. Power Apps, Power Automate, and Power BI let business users build solutions without code. This should reduce the custom development burden, but in practice, it often creates different problems. "Citizen developers" build solutions that work until they don't, and then professional developers get called in to fix the mess.
AI integration is the new frontier. Copilot for SharePoint promises to make content more discoverable and workflows more intelligent. But from a development perspective, it's another API to learn, another authentication method to implement, another potential point of failure.
The truth is, SharePoint isn't going away. Too many enterprises are invested. Too much business process depends on it. But the development experience needs to improve dramatically to keep pace with modern expectations.
Knowing When to Walk Away
The original poster mentioned migrating from SharePoint to something custom. Sometimes that's the right call. Not always—SharePoint does some things well—but sometimes.
If your use case is primarily document management with light metadata, SharePoint might be fine. If you need complex workflows, relational data, or high-performance APIs, you're probably better with something else.
The migration cost is real. Data migration, user retraining, rebuilding integrations—it's not trivial. But neither is the cost of fighting SharePoint every day. Developer time isn't free. Business opportunities lost to slow performance aren't free. Technical debt isn't free.
I've seen teams spend months working around SharePoint limitations that wouldn't exist in other platforms. At some point, you have to ask: are we building our business solution, or are we building SharePoint workarounds?
There's no one-size-fits-all answer. But if you find yourself spending more time fighting the platform than building value, it might be time to consider alternatives.
Wrapping Up: The SharePoint Reality Check
SharePoint development in 2026 is better than it was a decade ago, but that's a low bar. The fundamental issues—performance limitations, architectural complexity, integration pain—persist because they're baked into the platform's DNA.
If you have to work with SharePoint, go in with your eyes open. Understand the limitations. Work around them where you can. Push back when requirements would create unmaintainable solutions. And document everything—not just for the next developer, but for yourself six months from now when you've forgotten why you made a particular workaround.
Most importantly, remember that your value as a developer isn't measured by how well you can fight SharePoint. It's measured by the business problems you solve. Sometimes that means working within SharePoint's constraints. Sometimes it means finding another way.
Either way, at least now you know you're not alone in the struggle. That Reddit thread with 483 upvotes and 76 comments? Every one of those represents a developer who's felt the same pain. We might be working in different companies on different projects, but we're all navigating the same frustrating platform.
Here's to hoping Microsoft keeps listening. And in the meantime, here's to surviving another day in SharePoint development.
