Clone with better performance

Question

I want to create deep copy method and I found 3 ways to execute it

1-deep copy with pass each property 1 by 1

2-using reflection

3-using serialization

please which of them is the best at performance wise

Answer 1

The first option, manually deep copying your values, will be the most performant by far.

Reflection will introduce quite a bit of overhead, as it is (relatively) slow to access data.

Serialization is adding a huge cost, as it serializes the data into a temporary structure, then reverses the process to set. This is again, very slow.

The only advantage to option 2 or 3 is that its potentially easier to implement, and reusable across multiple types. The first option has to be hand-written per type, but is much faster (and more efficient in memory usage than option 3, as well).

Answer 2

I made graph with comparison of the three methods plus an expression trees method.

For large number of objects is reflection 5x faster and manual code and expression trees are 20x faster than serialization. The best by performance are therefore manual code and expression trees.

Links to used cloning codes (2.-4. used as an extension method):

1. Manual: Written manually, no link.
2. Cloning by Serialization
3. Cloning by Reflection
4. Cloning by Expression Trees