5 Best Practices I Follow in .NET 8 Development (And Why You Should Too)

Introduction:

With each new .NET release, we get powerful improvements—and in .NET 8, it's no exception. But the real power lies not just in upgrading apps, but in how we write and structure them. After working on enterprise-grade systems for over 19 years, these are the .NET 8 practices I consistently follow to build robust and scalable applications.

Best Practice 1: Lean APIs with Minimal APIs

.NET 8’s Minimal APIs are now production-ready and incredibly efficient for building lightweight, fast endpoints.

var builder = WebApplication.CreateBuilder(args);
var app = builder.Build();

app.MapGet("/status", () => Results.Ok("Running..."));
app.Run();

✅ Cleaner route declarations
✅ Less boilerplate
✅ Great for microservices or internal APIs

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🔹 Best Practice 2: Strong Typing with Records and Value Objects

Using records makes your domain models immutable and more expressive.

public record Email(string Value)
{
    public static Email From(string input)
    {
        if (!input.Contains("@")) throw new ArgumentException("Invalid email");
        return new Email(input);
    }
}

✅ Avoids primitive obsession
✅ Encapsulates business logic
✅ Enables safer refactoring

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🔹 Best Practice 3: Dependency Injection Everywhere

Use the new streamlined DI pattern in .NET 8 to keep services clean and testable.

builder.Services.AddScoped<IUserService, UserService>();

Inject dependencies clearly into constructors:

public class UserController
{
    private readonly IUserService _userService;
    public UserController(IUserService userService)
    {
        _userService = userService;
    }
}

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🔹 Best Practice 4: Secure Everything by Default

Whether it’s a public API or an internal tool, always secure with JWT or Azure AD.

builder.Services
    .AddAuthentication(JwtBearerDefaults.AuthenticationScheme)
    .AddJwtBearer(options =>
    {
        options.TokenValidationParameters = new TokenValidationParameters
        {
            ValidateIssuer = true,
            ValidateAudience = true,
            ValidateLifetime = true,
            ValidateIssuerSigningKey = true,
            // Issuer and key config here
        };
    });

✅ Don't store secrets in code
✅ Use Azure Key Vault or dotnet user-secrets
✅ Validate scopes/claims where applicable

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🔹 Best Practice 5: Performance-Aware Design

Use tools and patterns that prevent premature performance bottlenecks.

Span<byte> buffer = stackalloc byte[256];

✅ Use Span<T> where possible
✅ Pool memory allocations with ArrayPool<T>
✅ Monitor with dotnet-trace, App Insights, etc.

Final Thoughts

Best practices aren’t about trendy code, they’re about sustainable, maintainable systems. .NET 8 gives us excellent tools, but how we use them defines software quality. These five habits help me keep systems robust, testable, and ready for scale.