Difference between Kendo UI Web and Kendo UI ASP.NET for MVC

Question

When creating an MVC project via Visual Studio, Views are created with \".cshtml\" files.

The KendoUI Server Wrappers have a model in the View whereas the KendoUI Web no

Answer 1

Simply put, Kendo UI Web is open for any framework that can support javascript/jQuery but Kendo UI Server Wrappers/Kendo UI ASP.NET for MVC is for ASP.NET MVC projects only.

Working with Kendo UI Web will need lot of extra coding and handling, while the MVC version is more developer-friendly and easier to maintain. If you are working on ASP.NET MVC projects then you can make your coding easy with the server wrappers.

Kendo UI web is free to use, whereas the Server wrapper (Kendo UI for ASP.NET MVC) needs paid license per developer.

A simple example of the code differences for a kendo grid is as below:

with Server wrappers

@model IEnumerable

@(Html.Kendo().Grid(Model)    
    .Name("Grid")
    .Columns(columns =>
    {
        columns.Bound(p => p.ProductID).Groupable(false);
        columns.Bound(p => p.ProductName);
        columns.Bound(p => p.UnitPrice);
        columns.Bound(p => p.UnitsInStock);
    })
    .Groupable()
    .Pageable()
    .Sortable()
    .Scrollable()
    .Filterable()
    .DataSource(dataSource => dataSource
        .Ajax()
        .Read(read => read.Action("Products_Read", "Grid"))
    )
)

with Kendo UI Web

You can check the rendered grid here.

More details about server wrappers and Kendo UI Web.