Difference Between ViewResult() and ActionResult()

Question

What is the difference between ViewResult() and ActionResult() in ASP.NET MVC?

public ViewResult Index()
{
    return View();
}

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Answer 1

ViewResult is a subclass of ActionResult. The View method returns a ViewResult. So really these two code snippets do the exact same thing. The only difference is that with the ActionResult one, your controller isn't promising to return a view - you could change the method body to conditionally return a RedirectResult or something else without changing the method definition.

Answer 2

In the Controller , one could use the below syntax

public ViewResult EditEmployee() {
    return View();
}

public ActionResult EditEmployee() {
    return View();
}

In the above example , only the return type varies . one returns ViewResult whereas the other one returns ActionResult.

ActionResult is an abstract class . It can accept:

ViewResult , PartialViewResult, EmptyResult , RedirectResult , RedirectToRouteResult , JsonResult , JavaScriptResult , ContentResult, FileContentResult , FileStreamResult , FilePathResult etc.

The ViewResult is a subclass of ActionResult.