C# access modifier

last modified January 21, 2024

In this article we show how to control the visibility of methods and member fields in C#.

Access modifiers set the visibility of methods and member fields. C# has four basic access modifiers: public, protected, private and internal. The public members can be accessed from anywhere. The protected members can be accessed only within the class itself and by inherited and parent classes. The private members are limited to the containing type, e.g. only within its class or interface. The internal members may be accessed from within the same assembly (exe or DLL).

There are also two combinations of modifiers: protected internal and private protected. The protected internal type or member can be accessed by any code in the assembly in which it is declared, or from within a derived class in another assembly. The private protected type or member can be accessed only within its declaring assembly, by code in the same class or in a type that is derived from that class.

Access modifiers protect data against accidental modifications. They make the programs more robust.

	Class	Current assembly	Derived types	Derived types in current assembly	Entire program
public	+	+	+	+	+
protected	+	o	+	+	o
internal	+	+	o	o	o
private	+	o	o	o	o
protected internal	+	+	+	+	o
private protected	+	o	o	+	o

The above table summarizes C# access modifiers (+ is accessible, o is not accessible).

C# access modifier example

In the following example, we use public and private access modifiers.

var p = new Person();
p.name = "Jane";

p.SetAge(17);

Console.WriteLine($"{p.name} is {p.GetAge()} years old");

class Person
{
    public string name;
    private int age;

    public int GetAge()
    {
        return this.age;
    }

    public void SetAge(int age)
    {
        this.age = age;
    }
}

In the above program, we have two member fields. One is declared public, the other private.

public int GetAge()
{
    return this.age;
}

If a member field is private, the only way to access it is via methods. If we want to modify an attribute outside the class, the method must be declared public. This is an important aspect of data protection.

public void SetAge(int age)
{
    this.age = age;
}

The SetAge method enables us to change the private age variable from outside of the class definition.

var p = new Person();
p.name = "Jane";

We create a new instance of the Person class. Because the name attribute is public, we can access it directly. However, this is not recommended.

p.SetAge(17);

The SetAge method modifies the age member field. It cannot be accessed or modified directly because it is declared private.

Console.WriteLine($"{p.name} is {p.GetAge()} years old");

Finally, we access both members to build a string.

$ dotnet run
Jane is 17 years old

C# access modifier example II

Member fields with private access modifiers are not inherited by derived classes.

var derived = new Derived();
derived.info();

class Base
{
    public string name = "Base";
    protected int id = 5323;
    private bool isDefined = true;
}

class Derived : Base
{
    public void info()
    {
        Console.WriteLine("This is Derived class");
        Console.WriteLine("Members inherited");
        Console.WriteLine(this.name);
        Console.WriteLine(this.id);
        // Console.WriteLine(this.isDefined);
    }
}

In the preceding program, we have a Derived class which inherits from the Base class. The Base class has three member fields. All with different access modifiers. The isDefined member is not inherited. The private modifier prevents this.

class Derived : Base

The class Derived inherits from the Base class. To inherit from another class, we use the colon (:) operator.

Console.WriteLine(this.name);
Console.WriteLine(this.id);
// Console.WriteLine(this.isDefined);

The public and the protected members are inherited by the Derived class. They can be accessed. The private member is not inherited. The line accessing the member field is commented. If we uncommented the line, the code would not compile.

$ dotnet run
... warning CS0414: The field 'Base.isDefined' is assigned but its value is 
never used ...
This is Derived class
Members inherited
Base
5323

Source

Access Modifiers - programming guide

In this article we worked with C# access modifiers.

Author

My name is Jan Bodnar and I am a passionate programmer with many years of programming experience. I have been writing programming articles since 2007. So far, I have written over 1400 articles and 8 e-books. I have over eight years of experience in teaching programming.

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