Others have very well described the difference between First() and FirstOrDefault(). I want to take a further step in interpreting the semantics of these methods. In my opinion FirstOrDefault is being overused a lot. In the majority of the cases when you’re filtering data you would either expect to get back a collection of elements matching the logical condition or a single unique element by its unique identifier – such as a user, book, post etc... That’s why we can even get as far as saying that FirstOrDefault() is a code smell not because there is something wrong with it but because it’s being used way too often. This blog post explores the topic in details. IMO most of the times SingleOrDefault() is a much better alternative so watch out for this mistake and make sure you use the most appropriate method that clearly represents your contract and expectations.

首先，Take是一种完全不同的方法。它返回一个IEnumerable< t>而不是一个T，所以这是无效的。

在First和FirstOrDefault之间，当您确定一个元素存在，如果它不存在，那么就会出现错误时，应该使用First。

顺便说一下，如果你的序列包含默认(T)元素(例如null)，你需要区分空元素和第一个元素为空，你不能使用FirstOrDefault。

.First will throw an exception when there are no results. .FirstOrDefault won't, it will simply return either null (reference types) or the default value of the value type. (e.g like 0 for an int.) The question here is not when you want the default type, but more: Are you willing to handle an exception or handle a default value? Since exceptions should be exceptional, FirstOrDefault is preferred when you're not sure if you're going to get results out of your query. When logically the data should be there, exception handling can be considered.

Skip()和Take()通常在设置结果分页时使用。(比如显示前10个结果，接下来的10个在下一页，等等)

我发现了一个网站，它似乎解释了对FirstOrDefault的需求 http://thepursuitofalife.com/the-linq-firstordefault-method-and-null-resultsets/ 如果查询没有结果，并且您想调用First()或Single()来获得单行…您将得到一个“序列不包含元素”异常。

免责声明:我从未使用过LINQ，所以如果这是错误的，我很抱歉。

另一个需要注意的区别是，如果您在生产环境中调试应用程序，您可能无法访问行号，因此识别方法中哪个特定的. first()语句抛出异常可能很困难。

异常消息也不包括您可能使用过的任何Lambda表达式，这会使任何问题更难调试。

这就是为什么我总是使用FirstOrDefault()，即使我知道空条目将构成异常情况。

var customer = context.Customers.FirstOrDefault(i => i.Id == customerId);
if (customer == null)
{
   throw new Exception(string.Format("Can't find customer {0}.", customerId));
}

someList.First(); // exception if collection is empty.
someList.FirstOrDefault(); // first item or default(Type)

用哪一个? 它应该由业务逻辑决定，而不是担心异常/程序失败。

例如, 如果业务逻辑说我们在任何工作日都不可能有零事务(只是假设)。那么您不应该尝试使用一些聪明的编程来处理这种情况。 我将始终在这样的集合上使用First()，如果有其他东西搞砸了业务逻辑，则让程序失败。

代码:

var transactionsOnWorkingDay = GetTransactionOnLatestWorkingDay();
var justNeedOneToProcess = transactionsOnWorkingDay.First(): //Not FirstOrDefault()

我想看看其他人对此的评论。