Serving video file / stream from ASP Net Core 6 Minimal API

Question

Hi, I'm coming from NodeJs background and trying to get into building API's with ASP Net Core. I am experimenting with .Net Core 6 Minimal API as it looks quite familiar and simple to get going. I'm working on a project for streaming videos and I'm currently stuck on trying to figure out how do I serve / stream a video file for frontend?

I was trying different tutortials in

I have this bare minimal setup code for API with a single GET path "/video" mapped. I also made a folder "wwwroot" inside project folder. I placed in there a mp4 video file named "test.mp4". Would it be possible for someone knowledgeable to write a simple example of how to stream this file inside my mapped route ?

var builder = WebApplication.CreateBuilder(args);

builder.Services.AddEndpointsApiExplorer();
builder.Services.AddSwaggerGen();

var app = builder.Build();

if (app.Environment.IsDevelopment())
{
    builder.Logging.AddJsonConsole();
    app.UseSwagger();
    app.UseSwaggerUI();
}

app.UseHttpsRedirection();

app.MapGet("/video", () =>
{    


});

app.Run();

Answer 1

Hi @Aedma Martin ,

In the Asp.net core Minimal API application, you can use the Results.File to return file to download from your minimal APIs handler, like this:

app.MapGet("/video", (int id) =>  
{  
    var filename = "file_example.mp4";  
    //Build the File Path.  
    string path = Path.Combine(_hostenvironment.WebRootPath, "files/") + filename;  // the video file is in the wwwroot/files folder  
  
    var filestream = System.IO.File.OpenRead(path);  
    return Results.File(filestream, contentType: "video/mp4", fileDownloadName: filename, enableRangeProcessing: true);   
});  

Then, in the main view page, use the video tag to display the video:

  <video autoplay controls src="https://localhost:7093/video?id=1"></video>  

The result is like this:

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Best regards,
Dillion