Populate Controls Before Viewstate Is Being Tracked

If you do need ViewState, understand the page lifecycle and bind your data appropriately. A control loads its ViewState after Page_Init and before Page_Load, i.e. server controls don’t start tracking changes to their ViewState until the end of the initialization stage. Any changes to ViewState mean a bigger ViewState, because you have the before value and the after value. So, if you’re changing or setting a control’s value, set it before ViewState is being tracked, if possible.

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