What s the difference between KeyDown and KeyPress in NET

Question

What is the difference between the KeyDown and KeyPress events in  NET

User · Answer

The KeyPress event is not raised by noncharacter keys; however, the noncharacter keys do raise the KeyDown and KeyUp events.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/system.windows.forms.control.keypress

User · Answer

There is apparently a lot of misunderstanding about this   The only practical difference between KeyDown and KeyPress is that KeyPress relays the character resulting from a keypress  and is only called if there is one   In other words  if you press A on your keyboard  you ll get this sequence of events    KeyDown  KeyCode Keys A  KeyData Keys A  Modifiers Keys None KeyPress  KeyChar  a  KeyUp  KeyCode Keys A   But if you press Shift A  you ll get    KeyDown  KeyCode Keys ShiftKey  KeyData Keys ShiftKey  Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyDown  KeyCode Keys A  KeyData Keys A   Keys Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyPress  KeyChar  A  KeyUp  KeyCode Keys A KeyUp  KeyCode Keys ShiftKey   If you hold down the keys for a while  you ll get something like    KeyDown  KeyCode Keys ShiftKey  KeyData Keys ShiftKey  Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyDown  KeyCode Keys ShiftKey  KeyData Keys ShiftKey  Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyDown  KeyCode Keys ShiftKey  KeyData Keys ShiftKey  Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyDown  KeyCode Keys ShiftKey  KeyData Keys ShiftKey  Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyDown  KeyCode Keys ShiftKey  KeyData Keys ShiftKey  Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyDown  KeyCode Keys A  KeyData Keys A   Keys Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyPress  KeyChar  A  KeyDown  KeyCode Keys A  KeyData Keys A   Keys Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyPress  KeyChar  A  KeyDown  KeyCode Keys A  KeyData Keys A   Keys Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyPress  KeyChar  A  KeyDown  KeyCode Keys A  KeyData Keys A   Keys Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyPress  KeyChar  A  KeyDown  KeyCode Keys A  KeyData Keys A   Keys Shift  Modifiers Keys Shift KeyPress  KeyChar  A  KeyUp  KeyCode Keys A KeyUp  KeyCode Keys ShiftKey   Notice that KeyPress occurs in between KeyDown and KeyUp  not after KeyUp  as many of the other answers have stated  that KeyPress is not called when a character isn t generated  and that KeyDown is repeated while the key is held down  also contrary to many of the other answers   Examples of keys that do not directly result in calls to KeyPress    Shift  Ctrl  Alt F1 through F12 Arrow keys   Examples of keys that do result in calls to KeyPress    A through Z  0 through 9  etc  Spacebar Tab  KeyChar   t   ASCII 9  Enter  KeyChar   r   ASCII 13  Esc  KeyChar   x1b   ASCII 27  Backspace  KeyChar   b   ASCII 8    For the curious  KeyDown roughly correlates to WM KEYDOWN  KeyPress to WM CHAR  and KeyUp to WM KEYUP   WM KEYDOWN can be called fewer than the the number of key repeats  but it sends a repeat count  which  IIRC  WinForms uses to generate exactly one KeyDown per repeat

User · Answer

Keydown is pressing the key without releasing it  Keypress is a complete press-and-release cycle   Put another way  KeyDown   KeyUp   Keypress

User · Answer

Easiest explanation   I held down the  d  key for a second and then released   dddddd  the keydown event happened once before the first d appeared on the screen  the keypress event happened 6 times and the keyup event happened after the last d appeared on the screen

User · Answer

KEYUP will be captured only once  upon release of the key pressed  regardless of how long will the key be held down  so if you want to capture such press only once  KEYUP is the suitable event to capture

User · Answer

I ve always thought keydown happened as soon as you press the key down  keypress is the action of pressing the key and releasing it  I found this which gives a little different explanation  http   bytes com topic net answers 649131-difference-keypress-keydown-event

User · Answer

From MSDN   Key events occur in the following order   KeyDown  KeyPress  KeyUp    Furthermore  KeyPress gives you a chance to declare the action as  quot handled quot  to prevent it from doing anything

User · Answer

KeyPress is only fired by printable characters and is fired after the KeyDown event  Depending on the typing delay settings there can be multiple KeyDown and KeyPress events but only one KeyUp event   KeyDown  KeyPress  KeyUp

User · Answer

KeyPress is a higher level of abstraction than KeyDown  and KeyUp    KeyDown and KeyUp are hardware related  the actual action of a key on the keyboard   KeyPress is more  I received a character from the keyboard

User · Answer

From Blogging Developer   In order to understand the difference between keydown and keypress  it is useful to understand the difference between a  character  and a  key   A  key  is a physical button on the computer s keyboard while a  character  is a symbol typed by pressing a button  In theory  the keydown and keyup events represent keys being pressed or released  while the keypress event represents a character being typed  The implementation of the theory is not same in all browsers   Note  You can also try out the Key Event Tester  available on the above-mentioned site  to understand this concept

[.net] What's the difference between KeyDown and KeyPress in .NET?

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