Dapper (Micro-ORM)

Entity Framework Core is the heavyweight ORM in the .NET world: it tracks entity state, generates SQL, runs migrations, and lets you write LINQ instead of strings. That power comes with a real cost in indirection, allocations, and surprising query plans. Dapper sits at the other end of the spectrum. It's a tiny library that takes raw SQL you write and maps the result columns onto C# objects, and that's almost all it does. This lesson covers what Dapper is, how it compares to EF Core, the core APIs (Query, Execute, multi-mapping, QueryMultiple), and when to pick it.