Many times in an application we need to populate a dropdown list from enum.In the following article I will show how to implement the same using SelectListItem.

First we create an enum, FileType, under the Models folder as shown below.

namespace DropdownDemo.Models
{
    public enum FileType
    {
        Excel=1,
        PDF=2,
        TXT=3 

    }
}

Now we create View (Index.cshtml) as below.

@model DropdownDemo.Models.ActionModel
@{
    ViewBag.Title = "Index";
} 
@Html.LabelFor(model=>model.ActionId)
@Html.DropDownListFor(model=>model.ActionId, Model.ActionsList)

Next we create a list from an enum and add a model as below.

public class ActionModel
{
    public ActionModel()
    {
        ActionsList = new List<SelectListItem>();
    }
    [Display(Name="Actions")]
    public int ActionId { get; set; }
    public IEnumerable<SelectListItem> ActionsList { get; set; }       
}

Lastly we create a controller action method in Action Controller (ActionController.cs) that returns a view that binds with the model.

    public ActionResult Index()
    {
        ActionModel model = new ActionModel();
        IEnumerable<FileType> fileTypes = Enum.GetValues(typeof(FileType)).Cast<FileType>();
        model.ActionsList = from file in fileTypes
                            select new SelectListItem
                            {
                                Text = file.ToString(),
                                Value = file.ToString()
                            };
        return View(model);
    }

When the above code is executed the enum items will be populated in the dropdown.