Bind DropDownList from Database in ASP.NET C#

Updated on September 22, 2015     Kisan Patel

This tutorial will explain you how to populate or bind DropDownList from database in ASP.NET C#?

Here, we have used below “Countries” table to populate DropDownList with data.

Next, we have added DropDownList control inside Default.aspx page as shown in below code.

<form id="form1" runat="server">
  <div>
     <label for="dropdown_country">Select Country</label>
     <asp:DropDownList ID="dropdown_country" runat="server"></asp:DropDownList>
  </div>
</form>

Next, we have added below C# code inside Default.aspx.cs Page_Load event.

using System;
using System.Configuration;
using System.Data;
using System.Data.SqlClient;
using System.Web.UI;
using System.Web.UI.WebControls;

namespace DropDownDemo
{
    public partial class Default : System.Web.UI.Page
    {
        protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
        {
            if (!Page.IsPostBack) {

                SqlConnection con = new SqlConnection(ConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings["ConnectionString"].ConnectionString);

                con.Open();
                SqlCommand cmd = new SqlCommand("Select * from Countries", con);
                SqlDataAdapter da = new SqlDataAdapter(cmd);
                DataTable dt = new DataTable();
                da.Fill(dt);
                con.Close();

                //Set the DataSource for DropDown
                dropdown_country.DataSource = dt;
                dropdown_country.DataValueField = "Id";
                dropdown_country.DataTextField = "CountryName";
                dropdown_country.DataBind();
                dropdown_country.Items.Insert(0, new ListItem("Select Country", ""));
            }
        }
    }
}

Demo

Download Complete Source Code