What are the Differences between ASP.NET WEB API and .NET Core WEB API

 ASP.NET Core

ASP.NET Core is an open-source, cross-platform framework for building modern, cloud-based web apps on Windows, macOS, or Linux.

ASP.NET Core provides the following benefits:

• A unified story for building web UI and web APIs.
• Architected for testability.
• Razor Pages makes coding page-focused scenarios easier and more productive.
• Ability to develop and run on Windows, macOS, and Linux.
• Open-source and community-focused.
• Integration of modern, client-side frameworks and development workflows.
• A cloud-ready, environment-based configuration system.
• Built-in dependency injection.
• A lightweight, high-performance, and modular HTTP request pipeline.
• Ability to host on the following:
  • Kestrel
  • IIS
  • HTTP.sys
  • Nginx
  • Apache
  • Docker
• Side-by-side versioning.
• Tooling that simplifies modern web development.

The following table compares ASP.NET Core to ASP.NET 4.x.

FRAMEWORK SELECTION

ASP.NET Core	ASP.NET 4.x
Build for Windows, macOS, or Linux	Build for Windows
Razor Pages is the recommended approach to create a Web UI as of ASP.NET Core 2.x. See also MVC, Web API, and SignalR.	Use Web Forms, SignalR, MVC, Web API, WebHooks, or Web Pages
Multiple versions per machine	One version per machine
Develop with Visual Studio, Visual Studio for Mac, or Visual Studio Code using C# or F#	Develop with Visual Studio using C#, VB, or F#
Higher performance than ASP.NET 4.x	Good performance
Use .NET Core runtime	Use .NET Framework runtime