sqlite-entity-framework-integration.md

title	description	ms.date
.NET Aspire Community Toolkit SQLite Entity Framework integration	Learn how to use the .NET Aspire SQLite Entity Framework integration for efficient data management within your applications.	03/04/2025

.NET Aspire Community Toolkit SQLite Entity Framework integration

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SQLite is a lightweight, serverless, self-contained SQL database engine that is widely used for local data storage in applications. The .NET Aspire SQLite integration provides a way to use SQLite databases within your .NET Aspire applications, and access them via the Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.Sqlite Entity Framework support package.

Hosting integration

[!INCLUDE sqlite-hosting]

Client integration

To get started with the .NET Aspire SQLite EF client integration, install the 📦 CommunityToolkit.Aspire.Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.Sqlite NuGet package in the client-consuming project, that is, the project for the application that uses the SQLite client. The SQLite client integration registers a SqliteConnection instance that you can use to interact with SQLite.

.NET CLI

dotnet add package CommunityToolkit.Aspire.Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.Sqlite

PackageReference

<PackageReference Include="CommunityToolkit.Aspire.Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.Sqlite" Version="*" />

---

Add Sqlite client

In the :::no-loc text="Program.cs"::: file of your client-consuming project, call the Microsoft.Extensions.Hosting.AspireEFSqliteExtensions.AddSqliteDbContext extension method on any xref:Microsoft.Extensions.Hosting.IHostApplicationBuilder to register your xref:System.Data.Entity.DbContext subclass for use via the dependency injection container. The method takes a connection name parameter.

builder.AddSqliteDbContext<YourDbContext>(connectionName: "sqlite");

Tip

The connectionName parameter must match the name used when adding the SQLite resource in the app host project. For more information, see Add SQLite resource.

After adding YourDbContext to the builder, you can get the YourDbContext instance using dependency injection. For example, to retrieve your data source object from an example service define it as a constructor parameter and ensure the ExampleService class is registered with the dependency injection container:

public class ExampleService(YourDbContext context)
{
    // Use context...
}

For more information on dependency injection, see .NET dependency injection.

Enrich a SQLite database context

You may prefer to use the standard Entity Framework method to obtain the database contextand add it to the dependency injection container:

builder.Services.AddDbContext<YourDbContext>(options =>
    options.UseSqlite(builder.Configuration.GetConnectionString("sqlite")
        ?? throw new InvalidOperationException("Connection string 'sqlite' not found.")));

Note

The connection string name that you pass to the xref:Microsoft.Extensions.Configuration.ConfigurationExtensions.GetConnectionString* method must match the name used when adding the SQLite resource in the app host project. For more information, see Add SQLite resource.

Configuration

The SQLite client integration provides multiple configuration approaches and options to meet the requirements and conventions of your project.

Use a connection string

When using a connection string from the ConnectionStrings configuration section, you can provide the name of the connection string when calling the Microsoft.Extensions.Hosting.AspireEFSqliteExtensions.AddSqliteDbContext method:

builder.AddSqliteDbContext<YourDbContext>("sqlite");

Then the connection string will be retrieved from the ConnectionStrings configuration section.

{
  "ConnectionStrings": {
    "sqlite": "Data Source=C:\\Database\\Location\\my-database.db"
  }
}

Use configuration providers

The SQLite client integration supports xref:Microsoft.Extensions.Configuration?displayProperty=fullName. It loads the Microsoft.Extensions.Hosting.SqliteConnectionSettings from the :::no-loc text="appsettings.json"::: or other configuration providers by using the Aspire:Sqlite:EntityFrameworkCore:Sqlite key. Example _:::no-loc text="appsettings.json"::: that configures some of the options:

{
  "Aspire": {
    "Sqlite": {
      "EntityFrameworkCore": {
        "Sqlite": {
          "ConnectionString": "Data Source=C:\\Database\\Location\\my-database.db",
          "DisableHealthCheck": true
        }
      }
    }
  }
}