A virtual grid (or virtual mode) is ideal when the data to be manipulated with the grid is actually persisted in other data structures or files, such as a database.

Virtual mode can also improve the performance of your grid applications. If the number of rows and columns in your grid is large and your grid takes a long time to populate with data, virtual might perform better because the grid needs data only for the cells that are currently in view, not for every row. In other words, you supply values from your data structure for display in the grid only when the grid requests them. Grid requests are completed by overriding OnGetStyleRowCol or by attaching a delegate to the GetStyleRowCol event.

When data that is displayed in the grid is ready to be stored, GridControl invokes OnStoreStyleRowCol. You can override this method or attach a delegate to the StoreStyleRowCol event to store the data in your own data structures. For readonly grids, you would not have to handle the StoreStyleRowCol event.