Dapper
Hacker ApprovedRanked 4 of 11 ORMs by recommenders
Free .NET micro-ORM that maps hand-written SQL to objects with little fuss, valued for simplicity, few dependencies and speed. Critics find raw SQL and strings burdensome.
Free .NET micro-ORM that maps hand-written SQL to objects with little fuss, valued for simplicity, few dependencies and speed. Critics find raw SQL and strings burdensome.
22 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 19
- criticize it
- 3
- approval share
- 86%
Recommended in 7 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it carries the badge
- 19 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 6.3 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 7 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
You keep writing your own SQL
“Dapper is an unmitigated joy for me. i get to write the best sql needed for the case and then let the micro-orm handle the rest.”
Comment from 22 Dec 2025 in “The Rise of SQL:the second programming language everyone needs to know” “It does the object mapping, but you still write the queries as SQL.”
Comment from 5 Jul 2026 in “What ORMs have taught me: just learn SQL (2014)” “I like data adapters that make writing general SQL queries easier”
Comment from 30 Mar 2026 in “Spring Boot Done Right: Lessons from a 400-Module Codebase” - Comment from 7 Feb 2026 in “France's homegrown open source online office suite”
- Comment from 7 Aug 2026 in “Carl's Required Reading”
Simple object mapping from query results
“it’s so damn simple to send outrageous queries to the database and have those multiple mixed results turned into objects very simply”
Comment from 23 Aug 2026 in “Things I want in a modern relational query language” “With Dapper it’s particularly neat sometimes because you can just pass an object that you were using anyway”
Comment from 17 Feb 2026 in “Show HN: Pg-typesafe – Strongly typed queries for PostgreSQL and TypeScript” “Object mappers are 100% worth the effort and are often faster than hand translating the objects”
Comment from 2 Aug 2026 in “A stray commit buried multiple levels deep cost me months” - Comment from 4 Jun 2026 in “Learn SQL Once, Use It for 30 Years”
Few dependencies, easy to debug
“There were never [ORM] issues to debug and queries could easily be inspected.”
Comment from 22 Dec 2025 in “The Rise of SQL:the second programming language everyone needs to know” “when you have 3rd party dependencies you can literally count on one hand”
Comment from 7 Mar 2026 in “Package Managers Need to Cool Down” “Dapper remains the only constant 3rd party dependency in my projects.”
Comment from 1 Jun 2026 in “NPM packages from RedHat have been compromised” Strongly typed, parameterized queries
“It does exactly what I want: provides strongly-typed mapping and protects against SQL injection.”
Comment from 22 Dec 2025 in “The Rise of SQL:the second programming language everyone needs to know” “Easy enough with data types for parameterized inputs as well.”
Comment from 22 Dec 2025 in “The Rise of SQL:the second programming language everyone needs to know”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Raw SQL and strings seen as burdensome
“moving away from it as it brings nothing to the table but strings and bunch of SQL”
Comment from 26 Nov 2025 in “Reinventing how .NET builds and ships (again)” “tore all my Dapper + SQL and repositories out of a big project”
Comment from 26 Nov 2025 in “Reinventing how .NET builds and ships (again)”
Other ORMs people recommend
The four most recommended other ORMs, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Entity Framework Core | 35 | 19 | 65% | 12 | — | — |
| SQLAlchemy | 33 | 28 | 54% | 11 | — | — |
| Drizzle ORM | 25 | 6 | 81% | 10 | — | Approved |
| DapperThis page | 19 | 3 | 86% | 7 | — | Approved |
| Oxyde ORM | 18 | 3 | 86% | 2 | — | — |
What people said
All 28 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“it’s so damn simple to send outrageous queries to the database and have those multiple mixed results turned into objects very simply”
“it lets you use your own sql”
“Object mappers are 100% worth the effort and are often faster than hand translating the objects”
“I've not found a better library/pattern for SQL data access.”
“It does the object mapping, but you still write the queries as SQL.”
“something like Dapper in .net is an absolute godsend to convert it”
“Dapper remains the only constant 3rd party dependency in my projects.”
“I like data adapters that make writing general SQL queries easier”
“when you have 3rd party dependencies you can literally count on one hand”
“I never had this issue with Dapper”
“it's not just an issue with Dapper, it can also hit you with Entity Framework”
“Was a huge Dapper fan back in my C# days”
“With Dapper it’s particularly neat sometimes because you can just pass an object that you were using anyway”
“C#, Dapper and FastEndpoints FTW.”
“We make our queries much more explicit using tools like Dapper”
“hand-written SQL and Dapper; getting most page loads below 0.5 seconds”
“Easy enough with data types for parameterized inputs as well.”
“It does exactly what I want: provides strongly-typed mapping and protects against SQL injection.”
“There were never [ORM] issues to debug and queries could easily be inspected.”
“Dapper is an unmitigated joy for me. i get to write the best sql needed for the case and then let the micro-orm handle the rest.”
“This has proved hugely useful”
“moving away from it as it brings nothing to the table but strings and bunch of SQL”
“tore all my Dapper + SQL and repositories out of a big project”
“When using command query seperation you can also use dapper for queries and ef core for commands.”
“Replaced it with Dapper and a simple custom migration system.”
“We use Dapper for a handful of performance-critical queries.”
“Dapper can be a better fit depending on the scenario.”
“in C#/.Net I rely on Dapper”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.