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title: How Do Visualforce Pages Compare to S-Controls?
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# How Do Visualforce Pages Compare to S-Controls?

**important:** Visualforce pages supersede s-controls. Organizations that haven't previously used s-controls can’t create them. Existing s-controls are unaffected and can still be edited.



Visualforce pages are considered the next-generation of s-controls and should be used instead of s-controls whenever possible, both for their increased performance and the ease with which they can be written. The following table outlines the differences between Visualforce pages and s-controls.

| |Visualforce Pages|S-Controls|
|--|-----------------|----------|
|**Required technical skills**|HTML, XML|HTML, JavaScript, Ajax Toolkit|
|**Language style**|Tag markup|Procedural code|
|**Page override model**|Assemble standard and custom components using tags|Write HTML and JavaScript for entire page|
|**Standard Salesforce component library**|Yes|No|
|**Access to built-in platform behavior**|Yes, through the standard controller|No|
|**Data binding**|YesDevelopers can bind an input component (such as a text box) with a particular field (such as Account Name). If a user saves a value in that input component, it is also saved in the database.|NoDevelopers can't bind an input component with a particular field. Instead, they must write JavaScript code that uses the API to update the database with user-specified field values.|
|**Stylesheet inheritance**|Yes|No, must bring in Salesforce stylesheets manually|
|**Respect for field metadata, such as uniqueness** |Yes, by defaultIf a user attempts to save a record that violates uniqueness or requiredness field attributes, an error message is automatically displayed and the user can try again.|Yes, if coded in JavaScript using a `describe` API callIf a user attempts to save a record that violates uniqueness or requiredness field attributes, an error message is only displayed if the s-control developer wrote code that checked those attributes.|
|**Interaction with Apex**|Direct, by binding to a custom controller|Indirect, by using Apex `webService` methods through the API|
|**Performance**|More responsive because markup is generated on the Lightning Platform|Less responsive because every call to the API requires a round trip to the server—the burden rests with the developer to tune performance|
|**Page container**|Native|In an iFrame|