Working with JSON

Learn how to use the System.Text.Json namespace to serialize C# objects into JSON format, deserialize JSON back into objects, and seamlessly read and write JSON files asynchronously.

We'll cover the following...

Serialization (C# object to JSON)
- Formatting options
Deserialization (JSON to C# object)
Reading an existing JSON file
Writing JSON to a file

JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) is the industry standard format for data exchange, configuration files, and web APIs. It is a lightweight, text-based format that is easy for humans to read and write, and easy for machines to parse and generate.

Modern .NET provides the System.Text.Json namespace. This built-in library delivers high-performance JSON manipulation without relying on third-party packages. The two primary operations we perform with JSON are serialization and deserialization.

Serialization (C# object to JSON)

Serialization is the process of converting a .NET object (like a class or struct) into a JSON string. We use the JsonSerializer.Serialize method to convert a C# object into a JSON string.