Its 2024 and its time for a look at your Web API Tech Stack.

Hello everyone, this is my first post for 2024 and I hope you all had a great break.
Over the break I was thinking about some of the technologies I wanted to sink my teeth into in 2024.
The main two I will be focussing on are .Net Core 8 and Go.
For a full stack platform .Net/.Net Core is hard to beat and for pure backend API development you really can't beat Go.
When I was looking at some key features for any API development in .Net Core and Go I came up with this list that I thought I would share:
I have broken this down into a .Net Core Web API Vs. Go list with supporting links.

• Native compilation or as close to native compiled - Go Wins here. Although .Net 8 has AOT (Ahead of Time) compilation but not all libraries are supported. More info can be found here.

• Boilerplate/Starter templates - I have two projects to help get you started here :-). Go API Starter and .Net Minimal API Starter.

• Web Framework - Both support a rich web framework, but .Net core wins here from a full stack perspective. But from a pure speed and performance perspective GoLang wins, using the Fibre framework is unbeatable.

• Clean architecture - Both support this.
  Clean Architecture In ASP.NET Core Web API
  Go Backend Clean Architecture

• Logging - Both support this but its important to ensure that any logging framework supports a zero allocation model. For .Net use Serilog and for GoLang use Zerolog.

• gRPC - Both support this.
  Overview for gRPC on .NET
  gRPC-Go

• Docker/Containers - Both support this. Although .Net 8 has a much richer Docker integration (you can remove Docker files altogether) but the .Net docker image size is about 4 times larger. From a size and speed perspective GoLang wins here.
  Creating a Minimal API with Docker
  Containerize a .NET app with dotnet publish (new way..No Docker file)
  Containerize the go language REST API using Docker

• Rate Limiting - Both support this but can be tricky to implement and depends on the algorithm used.
  Rate limiting middleware in ASP.NET Core
  Rate Limiting API Calls in Go

• Profiling - Both support this.
  How to Use Mini Profiler in ASP.NET Core Web API
  Golang Profiling: The Basics and a Quick Tutorial

• Github Actions - Both support this.
  How To Build a CI/CD Pipeline With GitHub Actions And .NET
  GitHub Actions workflow for Go Continuous Integration

• Databases/ORM- Both support this but have different implementations.
  API Development Using Dapper and Microsoft Asp.NET Core Web API
  Entity Framework
  GORM (ORM library for Golang)
  SQLBoiler (database-first ORM)
  XORM (Simple and Powerful ORM for Go)

• Tracing - Both support this.
  Tracing in ASP.Net Web API
  Tracing runtime activities in Go.

• Exceptions - .Net has the more traditional exception handling approach whereas Go has error return/nil types.
  How to handle errors in Minimal API apps
  Error Handling in Go REST APIs

• Health Checks - Both support this.
  Health Checks In ASP.NET Core For Monitoring Your Applications
  Healthcheck (RESTful Healthcheck API implementation for Go services)

• Unit tests - Both support this.
  How to test your C# Web API
  Testify
  Testing REST APIs in Go

• Endpoint Grouping - Both support this.
  Minimal APIs quick reference (Route Groups)
  EndPoint Grouping .Net
  Go Fiber – Route Groups
  Fiber Framework in Golang

• API Key security - Both support this and have very similar implementations.
  Implement API Key Authentication in ASP.NET Core
  KeyAuth in Go Fiber

• API Versioning - Both support this.
  .Net MinimalApiExample
  Go Fiber Versioning Boilerplate

• Authentication & Authorization (JWT) - Both support this but depends on your use case and what you are authenticating against. JWT links are provided here:
  How to implement JWT authentication in ASP.NET Core
  jwt-go

So from the comparison above hopefully this will guide you in your decision. For pure speed and lightweight APIS with no startup delays, I recommend Go.
But .Net 8 isnt no slouch either and is a very close second. Very close. If you are after a rich and mature ecosystem and really amazing tooling, go with ASP.Net 8 Core.
thanks!