Bulk Extensions With EF Core

Getting Started

In that tutorial, you will learn how to use bulk extension methods in EF Core 8 and lower.

Unfortunately, EF Core doesn't formal API for performing any bulk operations, so to improve your performance with bulk operations, you will need to use the Entity Framework Extensions library created by ZZZ Projects.

EF Core Bulk Extensions - Methods

NuGet - EF Core Bulk Extensions

To add Entity Framework Extensions, you need the following NuGet package: https://www.nuget.org/packages/Z.EntityFramework.Extensions.EFCore/

You must match the EF Core major version with the EF Extensions major version. For example:

• If you are using EF Core 8.x, you need to use EF Extensions 8.x
• If you are using EF Core 7.x, you need to use EF Extensions 7.x
• If you are using EF Core 6.x, you need to use EF Extensions 6.x
• If you are using EF Core 5.x, you need to use EF Extensions 5.x

GitHub - EF Core Bulk Extensions

In addition to their site web, you can find some additional important information on GitHub:

• Project: https://github.com/zzzprojects/EntityFramework-Extensions
• Issues Tracking: https://github.com/zzzprojects/EntityFramework-Extensions/issues
• Release Notes: https://github.com/zzzprojects/EntityFramework-Extensions/releases

EF Core Bulk Insert Extensions

The BulkInsert is a method that improves performance over SaveChanges when you have to insert multiple entities. To perform a bulk insert, you need to call the method with the list of entities you want to insert.

context.BulkInsert(customer);

See the EF Core Bulk Insert Documentation.

EF Core Bulk Insert or Update Extensions (Upsert)

The BulkMerge is a method that improves performance over SaveChanges when you have to insert or update multiple entities. That is an upsert operation, which will update existing entities and insert non-existing ones. To perform a bulk merge, you need to call the method with the list of entities you want to insert or update.

context.BulkMerge(customer);

Learn more on EF Core Bulk Merge Documentation.

EF Core Bulk Insert or Update or Delete Extensions (Sync)

The BulkSynchronize is a method that improves performance over SaveChanges when you have to insert, update, or delete multiple entities. That is a sync operation, which will update existing entities, insert non-existing ones, and delete entities that are only existing in the list. To perform a bulk synchronization, you need to call the method with the list of entities you want to insert or update (without those you want to delete).

context.BulkSynchronize(customer);

Learn more on EF Core Bulk Synchronize Documentation.

EF Core Bulk Update Extensions

The BulkUpdate is a method that improves performance over SaveChanges when you have to update multiple entities. To perform a bulk update, you need to call the method with the list of entities you want to update.

context.BulkUpdate(customer);

Learn more on EF Core Bulk Update.

EF Core Bulk Delete Extensions

The BulkDelete is a method that improves performance over SaveChanges when you have to delete multiple entities. To perform a bulk delete, you need to call the method with the list of entities you want to delete.

context.BulkDelete(customer);

Learn more on EF Core Bulk Delete Documentation.

EF Core Bulk Read Extensions

The BulkRead is a method that allows reading data from the database with some advantage over the Where methods. For example, you can specify for a list which keys to use when retrieving a list.

context.Customers.BulkRead(list, key => new { x.FirstName, x.LastName });

Learn more on EF Core Bulk Read Documentation.

EF Core Bulk SaveChanges Extensions

The BulkSaveChanges is a method that improves performance over SaveChanges. Even if the SaveChanges is now very fast in EF Core, when using thousands of entities, you can still have some major performance improvement by using the BulkSaveChanges method. To perform a save with bulk operations, you need to replace the method SaveChanges with the method BulkSaveChanges.

context.BulkSaveChanges();

Learn more on EF Core SaveChanges Documentation.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the Z.EntityFramework.Extensions library is helpful when improving your CRUD performance (create, read, update, delete).

In this article, we only demonstrated the basic usage of those methods, but you can learn more about them by going directly to their respective documentation.