EF Core vs Dapper: A Comprehensive Guide for .NET Developers

Among all ORMs in the.NET ecosystem for database interactions, the two most popular are EF Core and Dapper. It is really important to decide the correct ORM for application since it affects the performance and scalability of an application. Though both serve the same purpose, each one has advantages over the other and is built for particular applications. This blog will consider EF Core and Dapper in detail, outlining some of their most prominent features, when to use each, and best practices on how to best use them in your project.

What is EF Core?

It is modern, open-source, full-featured, and cross-platform ORM that provides high-level abstraction over the database. It is developed by Microsoft. This lets.NET developers work with databases using LINQ queries, making it very easy for developers to perform a read-write operation on a database. It eliminates much of the boilerplate code required for database access.

When to Use EF Core

• You need to be able to write business logic without worrying about SQL syntax.
• Your application has complex relationships, navigation properties, and sophisticated entity mapping.
• You need database migrations and schema versioning.

What is Dapper?

Dapper is a simple, lightweight and high-performance micro ORM developed by Stack Overflow. It acts as an abstraction layer over raw SQL and best for performance scenarios and fine-grained control over queries. As it works with raw SQL query, it gives us full control over database quires that are executed. Dapper is very easy to use and the learning curve is very small.

When to Use Dapper

• Your project requires high performance and low overhead.
• You prefer writing SQL queries for better control.
• The application doesn’t require complex entity tracking or navigation properties.

Using EF Core: Example

• Install EF Core NuGet Packages

• Define a Model

• Create a DbContext

• Query the Database

Using Dapper: Example

• Install Dapper NuGet Package

• Perform Queries with Dapper

• Insert Data

Best Practices

• EF Core Best Practices
  • Use NoTracking for read-only queries to improve performance:

• Avoid lazy loading for better performance; prefer eager or explicit loading.
• To use compiled queries for very frequently executed queries.

• Dapper Best Practices
  • We should always have parameterized queries to stop SQL injection attack.
  • Use a using statement to manage their connections.
  • Used stored procedure for complex procedures.
  • Avoid an overdependence on Dapper if they are using lots of changes tracking features

Benchmarking to Compare Ef core & dapper performance- Using Benchmark DotNet

• Installed NuGet Package Benchmark DotNet End

• Include Db context for EF Core as below

• Include Entity class

• Methods to check benchmark for select data from database by using EF Core and Dapper

• Methods to check benchmark for inserting data from database by using EF Core and Dapper

• Methods to check benchmark for update  data from database by using EF Core and Dapper

• Summary of benchmarks between EF Core and Dapper is as follows

• Combining EF Core and Dapper

You don’t have to choose one over the other; EF Core and Dapper can coexist in the same application. Use EF Core for CRUD operations and managing relationships, and Dapper for high-performance, custom queries.