While delivering my presentation for the Rock Your Code: Code and App Performance for Microsoft .NET session at the Silicon Valley Code Camp (recognized as the largest community-run conference globally), an attendee posed an intriguing question regarding the performance implications of using the When() clause when catching exceptions. Captivated by the inquiry, I performed performance testing to offer an insightful response.

Two Approaches to Exception Handling

Since the inception of .NET, the conventional approach to handling code exceptions has been a crucial aspect of programming. This practice is vital to safeguard the application or service from unexpected disruptions.

try
{
    //Code that could cause an Exception
}
catch (ArgumentNullException nullEx)
{
    return nullEx.Message;
}
catch (ArgumentOutOfRangeException outOfRangeEx)
{
    return outOfRangeEx.Message;
}

A more recent and simplified method for handling exceptions is by utilizing the When() clause, as demonstrated below:

try
{
    //Code that could cause an Exception
}
catch (Exception ex) when (ex is ArgumentNullException || 
                           ex is ArgumentOutOfRangeException)
{
    return ex.Message;
}

Benchmark Results

Here are the results for the two methods of trapping exceptions mentioned above. These tests demonstrate that when capturing multiple similar exceptions, using try/catch is 1.03 times more efficient.

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