# Entity Framework Core Reviews **Vendor:** Microsoft **Category:** [ Database DevOps Software](https://www.g2.com/categories/database-devops-software) **Average Rating:** 4.5/5.0 **Total Reviews:** 26 ## About Entity Framework Core Entity Framework Core is a lightweight, extensible, open-source, and cross-platform version of Microsoft's popular Entity Framework data access technology. It serves as an object-relational mapper , enabling .NET developers to interact with databases using .NET objects, thereby eliminating much of the boilerplate code typically required for data access. EF Core supports multiple database engines, making it a versatile choice for various applications. Key Features and Functionality: - Cross-Platform Support: EF Core runs on .NET Core, allowing applications to operate seamlessly across different operating systems, including Windows, Linux, and macOS. - Modular and Lightweight: Designed with a modular architecture, EF Core provides only the necessary components for object-relational mapping, with the flexibility to extend functionality as needed. - LINQ Integration: Developers can utilize Language Integrated Query to perform database operations, enabling expressive and type-safe queries directly within C# code. - Change Tracking: EF Core automatically tracks changes made to entities, simplifying the process of updating the database with modified data. - Migrations: The framework supports code-based migrations, facilitating the evolution of the database schema alongside the application's data model. - Lazy Loading: EF Core provides lazy loading capabilities, allowing related data to be loaded from the database only when explicitly requested, which can improve application performance by fetching only the necessary data. - Support for Multiple Database Providers: EF Core is compatible with various database engines, including SQL Server, SQLite, PostgreSQL, and more, offering flexibility in database selection. Primary Value and Problem Solved: EF Core streamlines data access in .NET applications by abstracting the complexities of database interactions. It allows developers to work with databases using object-oriented principles, reducing the need for extensive data-access code. This abstraction enhances developer productivity, ensures type safety through LINQ queries, and provides a consistent approach to data access across different platforms and database systems. By managing tasks such as change tracking and migrations, EF Core enables developers to focus more on business logic rather than the intricacies of database operations. ## Entity Framework Core Reviews ### 1. Entity Framework Core: Fast, Intuitive, and Type-Safe Data Access with LINQ **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer Software | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** May 05, 2026 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Entity Framework Core is a phenomenal tool for .NET developers because it smoothly bridges the gap between object-oriented programming and relational databases through LINQ. It offers an intuitive, type-safe experience that can significantly speed up development, while still giving you the flexibility to manage complex migrations and support high-performance data operations across multiple platforms. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** As much as I love EF Core for the speed it gives me, it definitely has a few quirks that make me want to pull my hair out sometimes. One of the biggest headaches is the "Magic SQL" problem. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Entity Framework Core reduces the “cognitive friction” that comes from constantly switching between C# and SQL. For me, it’s really about staying in “code mode” while still tapping into the full power of the database, without feeling like I’m giving anything up. ### 2. EF Core Best ORM in .NET **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Rahul T. | Full Stack Developer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 05, 2024 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** The best thing about it is that you can directly define and manage database schema through your C# code, thus making development faster and less prone to human errors. And 2nd thing you can easily integrate it with any database, even without any prior knowledge of it. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** The only thing I dislike about it is while working in a big team we sometimes face conflict errors which are a bit hard to track. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Making it easy to write database schema and decreasing human error. We can also change our database at any point in time without making large changes. ### 3. Entity Framework Core Review **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Nishedh J. | Senior Technology Manager / Lead .Net developer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** March 24, 2024 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** One of the best ORM for .Net as supports cross platform, supports code first, migrations, LINQ, can call direct stored procedure, etc. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** May have issue with learning, at first it may take a bit time to learn. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** can integrate with .Net core, ORM, LINQ, can call stored procedure, abstraction etc. ### 4. Best ORM for.net development **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Niraj O. | Software Engineer IIA, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 16, 2023 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Best ORM for development and easy to integrate with your data access layer with easily sync with your database changes from code to db and db to code. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** It should be compatible with more db types **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Code with db queries and code first approach with easily sync with db and we can manage migration to up to date db and also part of code due to code first approach. ### 5. Entity Framework Core works great with the .Net Apps **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Anuj G. | Developer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 31, 2024 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** The way Entity Framework Core allows us to create applications and connect to the Database using the code first approach. It's easy to create the classes and then create the Database tables using those classes and the connectivity and data transfer is seamless. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Nothing in particular. Everything works very well. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** EF Core allows us to work with data on a higher level of abstraction by using objects of domain-specific classes. It eliminates the need for most of the data-access code that we need to write. ### 6. Best ORM for .NET Core **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer Software | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 07, 2023 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Learning curve for EF Core is very less since it is a successor of legacy Entity Framework. It is much faster, secure and easy to use .NET Core ORM that works with SQL Server, MySQL & PostgreSQL databases. It's huge community adoption has proved that it is reliable and performant on production application as well. Since it is backed by Microsoft, there are no further questions. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Honestly, there is no point to dislike this framework. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Entity Framework Core helps us in writing the datalayer while building an application. We can use either Database First or Code First approach with EF Core. With EF Core, we can build apps in .NET Core that can run on Linux, saving us a lot of money on Windows licencing. ### 7. Powerful and Flexible ORM **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Kashif F. | Chief Technology Officer, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 07, 2024 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** support mutlipe databases and large set of APIs **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** difficult to handle Migration in many clients for single codebase **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Create, and manage databases Seeding Initial Data, Object Mapping ### 8. EF Core is intuitive and flexible. **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer Software | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 10, 2023 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Entity Framework core allows you to either create database access that is code first or database first. It is very easy to set up if you want to go database first or if you put in the work to set up classes and entities it is very nice to have your database created and migrations managed by ef core. It is very simple to integrate into a dotnet core app with an existing DB if you want an easier to write database queries with the power of Linq. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Not a lot of downsides, sometimes queries will not be optimised out of the box. Sometimes you will get conflict errors with updates or inserts when you don't know how ef core tracks entities. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** I use it to manage database access in dotnet core apps, but primarily it's to allow easy writing of complex queries for updates, inserts, and even as simple as gets. As long as it can be translated to sql it makes it very easy to use. It also makes understanding table relationships very easy for developers when writing queries. ### 9. Entity Framework Core **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Shivam S. | Software Engineer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** September 13, 2023 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Entity Framework's Code-First approach stands out as a remarkable feature. It empowers developers to define and manage the database schema directly within their C# code, simplifying the development process and fostering a more intuitive workflow. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Azure DevOps pipeline lacks full support for database migrations. It would be highly beneficial to have a tool within the DevOps Pipeline that can apply migrations when necessary, all configured through YAML. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** It acts as an open-source ally, streamlining database connectivity and querying processes, thus alleviating the necessity of crafting extensive, often repetitive, code structures that could span over a hundred lines. ### 10. Connect directly with any DB and execute **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** SRIRAM M. | Software Developer, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 17, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** It gives me a good advantage in handling multi-threading and multi-connections from the same application. It also helps me maintain the loosely coupled code from an application standpoint. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Some of the errors while executing queries may be difficult to debug. The error description will be so generic, and I feel like the error description can be improved. More details documents can be provided for the initial setup. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** The conventional way of connection gives me a hard time while coding or developing a large-scale application. Despite any type of database, we can write our structure with the entity framework. ### 11. Entity Framework, Easy to work with **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Alaeddin A. | Senior Software Engineer, Program Development, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 09, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Working with Entity Framework for more than five years, found it one of the easiest tools to help implement .net applications with SQL servers. Also, It's very easy to add a new DB layer By changing the Entity framework provider from SQL server to Oracle. With a few lines of code. Entity Framework works very nicely with Code first. Excellent documentation. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** The DB migration is not fully supported by the Azure DevOps pipeline; It would be very nice if we had a tool in the DevOps Pipeline to apply the migration if needed in the Yaml. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Entity Framework solve many issues by saving time to avoid writing maybe 100 lines of code to be a few lines. To make the DB connection or query a Database. Open source project. Always get security patches. ### 12. Entity Framework Core Review **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Jonathan M. | Data Analytics, Online Media, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 11, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Thanks to Entity Framework core, I and other developers all over the world can easily connect to databases and perform mundane and complex tasks in the.NET framework without causing the system to bog down. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** When working with newer versions, it can be difficult to implement updates since incompatible dlls make it necessary to rethink our approach to the SOLAN in projects and double-check that everything is in sync. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** With Entity Framework core, you can easily retrieve data from any database and save it to another table or column. As a result of implementing entity framework core, our entire project has become more portable and user-friendly. ### 13. Importance of Entity Framework in O365 **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Suman K. | Associate Software Engineer, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 07, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Entity Framework core is lightweight and cross platform that allow me and other developers around the globe to connect with database and perform crud and many more operations in dot net framework. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Updates are little hectic making it at times complex to implement as with newer versions we don't get compatible dlls and we have to find another way to approach the soln in projects and make sure our projects are aligned with them. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Entity Framework core is solving the biggest problem of fetching and writing back data to any database and making it very easy and effective. Using entity framework core makes our whole project lightweight and easy to use. ### 14. Entity Framework Core as a best platform **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Vaibhav S. | Air Traffic Controller, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 31, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Its interface is best ,where work is so smooth that its like a butter,and it helps to speed up whole process and saves time ,saves cost and at same time help in good user interface **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Very few things not to like but its a world class project,it suffers from very things which needs to be improved ,its backward compatibility needs to improve as well it must be interoperable **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Its is helping in reducing development time and development cost .It provides auto generated codes and allow developers to visually design models and mapping of database ### 15. One of the best concept for developer which help and save time resource both. **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Sanjay Kumar C. | Senior Web Application Developer, Computer Software, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 20, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** It automatically create database from model and also create model from database. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** There is nothing to dislike as everything is usefull. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** It save time of creating database seperatly and also save time to write code to map database table to model ### 16. Entity for easy and quick operations **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Rohini B. | O, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 03, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** It's best frame work to finish things very easy and quick with DB **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Complicated syntax Not available for all rdbms Slowprocess **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Offers auto migration Reduces time and cost ### 17. Works perfectly for my when i need to create a simple application with to store some kind of data. **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Carlos Osvaldo C. | Software Engineer, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 02, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** The most helpful feature for me is the simplicity of this implementation. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** I wish it had better performance, similar to dapper. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** EF Core keeps simple the way to access, store and retrieve the information of databases. ### 18. EF Core is a well thought out ORM that speeds the time to write CRUD operations **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Accounting | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 04, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** EF Core works with various databases and makes it relatively easy to write CRUD code to interface with a database. Instead of hand coding use ADO.NET directly you have a nice abstraction layer. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** So far, we have been happy with EF Core. The performance metrics are looking pretty good - this was our biggest concern before using it but so far, so good, we have not had any issues. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Improve our rapid application development cycles. We wanted to reduce the amount of time it takes to write data access code as well as reduce the boiler plate code you typically need. ### 19. Productive is Entity framework Core **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Sudharshan S. | CEO, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 19, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** The command line arguments for performing a table mapping or a database mapping is very very nice and helps us in using a devops method. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Wish in the future it prepares DDL commands for each table for cross joins too via Linq **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Speed and efficiency of programmers definitely improve with Entity framework core ### 20. Pretty fast and flexible **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Vikas T. | Technical Lead, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 15, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Reduces the efforts to write SQL queries every time and map them to POJO objects. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Decreases the control of the generated SQL query. Debugging for the query is also tough. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Fetch data from DB in an elegant way. ### 21. Easy to understand and use. **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** VISHAL K. | Analyst - Category and Customer Insights, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 11, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** The most helpful thing about entity framework is it reduces development time while creating applications. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** It does not exclude additional data and has some unnecessary data. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** It helps in cutting the cost as development time comes down ### 22. Framework core us a very efficient and reliable source to use **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Haruna S. | Activist, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 28, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Framework allows users to navigate through it's website and use it easily **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** I don't have anyy dislike about the app unless to suggest you add more content to support customer satisfaction **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Helkps on database mapping, tracking etc ### 23. Lightweight framework for everyone. **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Lakshit S. | Growth associate, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 13, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** Entity core framework reduces development time and cost! **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Data Migrations Break Easily & Lack of Certain Functionality like poorly written SQL queries. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** cost benefit ### 24. it's pretty nice **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer & Network Security | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 13, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** love that it's open source, gives it a sense of community, and opens it up for other developers to work on. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Could be kind of tricky to understand up front. Need to take a good look at the documentation. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** enables the companies .NET developers to connect to databases, utilizing .NET objects ### 25. Review for entity framework core **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Marketing and Advertising | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 07, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** It enable .net developer to access database using .net objects and is very fast and easy to use. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** Upon update the speed is reduced which effects the process and another issue is difficulty in working with large domain models. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** It provides a unique syntax for all object queries all around the database. ### 26. *Microsoft core Framework review **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Education Management | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** November 09, 2022 **What do you like best about Entity Framework Core?** The architecture of the framework is very good. **What do you dislike about Entity Framework Core?** complexity of the framework not easy to understand. **What problems is Entity Framework Core solving and how is that benefiting you?** Budgeting to reduce the cost. - [View Entity Framework Core pricing details and edition comparison](https://www.g2.com/products/entity-framework-core/reviews?section=pricing&secure%5Bexpires_at%5D=2026-06-02+18%3A29%3A23+-0500&secure%5Bsession_id%5D=21815361-16c0-44fe-9828-a3fd3c82a5c4&secure%5Btoken%5D=1c3971981ffb86ed1cd6dee44f55d8f8faad45b68941f632c4e8f3170d3517bd&format=llm_user) ## Entity Framework Core Features **Functionality** - Automation - Change validation - Version control **Management** - Visibility - Rollbacks - Post-deployment validation ## Top Entity Framework Core Alternatives - [Harness Platform](https://www.g2.com/products/harness-platform/reviews) - 4.6/5.0 (277 reviews) - [DbVisualizer](https://www.g2.com/products/dbvisualizer/reviews) - 4.7/5.0 (263 reviews) - [Liquibase](https://www.g2.com/products/liquibase/reviews) - 4.5/5.0 (28 reviews)