Get started with the Valkey integration

Valkey is a Redis fork and complies with the Redis serialization protocol (RESP). It's a high-performance key/value datastore that supports a variety of workloads such as caching, message queues, and can act as a primary database. The Valkey integration enables you to connect to existing Valkey instances, or create new instances from Aspire with the docker.io/valkey/valkey container image.

In this introduction, you'll see how to install and use the Aspire Valkey integrations in a simple configuration. If you already have this knowledge, see Valkey hosting integration for full reference details.

Set up hosting integration

To begin, install the Aspire Valkey hosting integration in your Aspire AppHost project:

dotnet add package Aspire.Hosting.Valkey

Next, in the AppHost project, create instances of Valkey resources and pass them to the consuming client projects:

var builder = DistributedApplication.CreateBuilder(args);
  
var cache = builder.AddValkey("cache");
  
var myService = builder.AddProject<Projects.ExampleProject>()
                       .WithReference(cache);
  
builder.Build().Run();

When Aspire adds a container image to the AppHost, it creates a new Valkey instance on your local machine.

Set up client integration

Valkey is Redis-compatible, so you use the same Redis client packages. To get started, install the package:

dotnet add package Aspire.StackExchange.Redis

In the Program.cs file of your client-consuming project, call the AddRedisClient extension method to register an IConnectionMultiplexer:

builder.AddRedisClient(connectionName: "cache");

You can then retrieve the IConnectionMultiplexer instance using dependency injection:

public class ExampleService(IConnectionMultiplexer connectionMux)
{
    // Use connection multiplexer...
}

See also

• Valkey hosting integration
• Valkey client integration
• Redis integration