What does `static` mean in c#?

by

In short, static effectively means “associated with a type instead of any one instance of the type”. So there’s one set of static variables for a type (within an AppDomain) whether you have 0 instances or a million; you don’t need an instance to access a static member, etc.

The exact point of initialization of static variables depends on whether there’s also a static constructor or not, but very broadly speaking it’s “once, usually before anything significant happens in the class”. (See this blog post for a more detailed description.)

While readonly fields can be either static or instance (i.e. related to the type or related to an instance of the type), const values are always implicitly static (they’re compile-time constants, so it wouldn’t make sense to have one copy per instance).

You may sometimes see static being described as “shared between all instances of a type” – I personally dislike that description, as it suggests that there has to be at least one instance… whereas actually, you don’t need any instances in order to use a static member. I prefer to think of them as entirely separate, rather than being “shared” between instances.

More Related Contents:

  1. When to use static classes in C# [duplicate]
  2. Can I add extension methods to an existing static class?
  3. Lifetime of ASP.NET Static Variable
  4. Why can’t I inherit static classes?
  5. Static vs non-static class members
  6. Is the order of static class initialization in C# deterministic?
  7. What is the use of static variable in C#? When to use it? Why can’t I declare the static variable inside method?
  8. When do static variables get initialized in C#?
  9. Are static class instances unique to a request or a server in ASP.NET?
  10. Are static methods thread safe
  11. Static Indexers?
  12. Should C# methods that *can* be static be static? [closed]
  13. Scope of static Variable in multi-user ASP.NET web application
  14. What’s the correct alternative to static method inheritance?
  15. Use dependency injection in static class
  16. How to access page controls inside a static web method? [duplicate]
  17. How can I get the value of a session variable inside a static method?
  18. Dependency injection with a static logger, static helper class
  19. Calling a Variable from another Class
  20. C# static member “inheritance” – why does this exist at all?
  21. C# – static types cannot be used as type arguments
  22. How to implement virtual static properties?
  23. Why choose a static class over a singleton implementation?
  24. Why must C# operator overloads be static?
  25. Are static members of a generic class tied to the specific instance?
  26. What is the difference between static methods in a Non static class and static methods in a static class?
  27. How to compile C# application with C++ static library?
  28. Why is it impossible to declare extension methods in a generic static class?
  29. Why static fields initialization occurs before the static constructor?
  30. How does HttpContext.Current work in a multi-threaded environment?

Leave a Comment