Partial Views vs View Components in ASP.NET Core

Partial Views and View Components in ASP.NET Core both allow reusable UI, but they differ in capabilities and purpose.

Key Differences:

• Partial Views: Simple, reusable Razor markup; ideal for static or model-bound content; no separate logic.
• View Components: Encapsulate both UI and logic, can fetch data, and support asynchronous operations.

Example – Partial View: _Header.cshtml

<header>
    <h1>@ViewData["Title"]</h1>
</header>

Render in a view:

@await Html.PartialAsync("_Header")

Example – View Component:

public class PopularProductsViewComponent : ViewComponent
{
    public IViewComponentResult Invoke()
    {
        var products = new List<string> { "Laptop", "Mobile" };
        return View(products);
    }
}

Render in a view:

@await Component.InvokeAsync("PopularProducts")

Partial Views are best for markup reuse, while View Components are ideal when logic and data fetching is required along with the UI.

Citations:

• Learn more on Savanka
• Official ASP.NET Core Documentation