What is delegates in c#?

C# delegates are similar to pointers to functions, in C or C++. A delegate is a reference type variable that holds the reference to a method. The reference can be changed at runtime.

Delegates are especially used for implementing events and the call-back methods. All delegates are implicitly derived from the System.Delegate class.

A delegate can be declared using delegate keyword followed by a function signature as shown below.

<access modifier> delegate < return type> <delegate_name>(<parameters>)

The following example declares a Print delegate. 

public delegate void Print(int value)

Instantiating Delegates

Once a delegate type is declared, a delegate object must be created with the new keyword and be associated with a particular method. When creating a delegate, the argument passed to the new expression is written similar to a method call, but without the arguments to the method.

Example:

class Program
{
    // declare delegate
    public delegate void Print(int value);

    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        // Print delegate points to PrintNumber
        Print printDel = PrintNumber;
          
        printDel(100000);
        printDel(200);

        // Print delegate points to PrintMoney
        printDel = PrintMoney;

        printDel(10000);
        printDel(200);
    }

    public static void PrintNumber(int num)
    {
        Console.WriteLine("Number: {0,-12:N0}",num);
    }

    public static void PrintMoney(int money)
    {
        Console.WriteLine("Money: {0:C}", money);
    }
}
 

Output:

Number: 10,000 
Number: 200 
Money: $ 10,000.00 
Money: $ 200.00

    Here, we have declared Print delegate that accepts int type parameter and returns void. In the Main() method, a variable of Print type is declared and assigned a PrintNumber method name. Now, invoking Print delegate will in-turn invoke PrintNumber method. In the same way, if the Print delegate variable is assigned to the PrintMoney method, then it will invoke the PrintMoney method.