Work with data using code in Microsoft Dataverse

  • 2 minutes to read

Note

Effective November 2020:

  • Common Data Service has been renamed to Microsoft Dataverse. Learn more
  • Some terminology in Microsoft Dataverse has been updated. For example, entity is now table and field is now column. Learn more

This article will be updated soon to reflect the latest terminology.

Dataverse has entities that are used to model and manage business data. You can use standard entities or create your own custom entities to store data.

Use web services to work with data

Dataverse provides two web services that you can use to interact with data: Web API and Organization Service. Choose the one that best matches the requirement and your skills.

Flow diagram to choose web service

Web API

The Web API is an OData v4 RESTful endpoint. Use this for any programming language that supports HTTP requests and authentication using OAuth 2.0.

More information: Use the Dataverse Web API

Organization service

Use the .NET Framework SDK assemblies for projects that involve writing plug-ins or workflow extensions.

More information: Use the Dataverse Organization Service

Note

Use the Xrm.Tooling assemblies if you are creating a Windows client application. More information: Build Windows client applications using the XRM tools

Note

Can you tell us about your documentation language preferences? Take a short survey.

The survey will take about seven minutes. No personal data is collected (privacy statement).