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Handling Event Handlers in WPF with MVVM - Memory Leak Issues on ViewModel Disposal

πŸ‘€ Views: 2 πŸ’¬ Answers: 1 πŸ“… Created: 2025-06-04
wpf mvvm memory-leak C#

I'm having a hard time understanding I'm working with a question with memory leaks in my WPF application while using the MVVM pattern. Specifically, I have a ViewModel that subscribes to events from a service to update the UI when data changes. However, after navigating away from the view that uses this ViewModel, the application does not seem to release the memory associated with it, leading to increasing memory usage. Here’s a simplified version of my ViewModel: ```csharp public class MyViewModel : INotifyPropertyChanged, IDisposable { private readonly MyService _myService; private bool _disposed; public MyViewModel(MyService myService) { _myService = myService; _myService.DataChanged += OnDataChanged; } private void OnDataChanged(object sender, EventArgs e) { // Update properties and notify UI } public void Dispose() { Dispose(false); } protected virtual void Dispose(bool disposing) { if (_disposed) return; if (disposing) { _myService.DataChanged -= OnDataChanged; // Unsubscribe from event } _disposed = true; } } ``` I’m unsubscribing from the event in the `Dispose` method, but I suspect that the ViewModel might still be referenced somewhere, preventing it from being garbage collected. I’ve also tried using a WeakEventManager for event subscription, but that didn't resolve the scenario either. I can see the memory usage in the diagnostic tools increasing when the view is opened and closed multiple times. I'm using .NET 5 and my application architecture follows the MVVM pattern closely, utilizing dependency injection for the ViewModel instantiation. Does anyone have experience with similar issues or suggestions on how to ensure that my ViewModel is properly disposed of and memory is released? What best practices can I follow to manage event subscriptions in WPF to avoid memory leaks? I'm using C# latest in this project. How would you solve this?