Mature applications often find themselves in the predicament of having to do work "behind the scenes." Frequently, this could be simple tasks such as sending emails or updating statistics, or it could be something more complicated, like processing incoming files or building reports. These tasks should not impede the user experience because they can be done in the background.

But in modern .NET applications, what's the best way to implement background services? There isn't necessarily a right or wrong way, but there are ways that are "easy to write" and methods that are "easy to scale."

This talk aims to take you on a journey through several processes that allow you to work in the background. We'll cover the pros and cons of different approaches and leave you with actionable advice to apply to your projects. We'll even cover deployment strategies and how we do this with real projects today.

This talk has been updated for the 2024-2025 conference season. It will cover various ways to build background services, including IHostedService, HangFire, and Corvel.