EF and Dapper are both ORMs. But Dapper can be called as micro ORM.
Clearly, Dapper is faster than EF. One main Trade-off is maintenance vs performance.
Advantages of Dapper:
Dapper make it easy to correctly parameterized queries
It can easily execute queries (scalar, multi-rows, multi-grids, and no-results)
Make it easy to turn results into objects
It is very efficient in terms of performance.
Disadvantages of Dapper:
Dapper can't generate a class model for you
It cannot generate queries for you
It cannot track objects and their changes
The raw dapper library doesn't provide CRUD features but there are other third party extensions which we can use.
Advantages of EF:
Entity Framework allows you to create a model by writing code or using boxes and lines in the EF Designer and generate a new database.
You can write code against the Entity Framework, and the system will automatically produce objects for you as well as track changes on those objects and simplify the process of updating the database.
One common syntax (LINQ) for all object queries whether it is a database or not and pretty fast if used as intended, easy to implement and less coding required to accomplish complex tasks.
The EF can replace a large chunk of code you would otherwise have to write and maintain yourself.
It provides auto-generated code
It reduces development time and cost.
It enables developers to visually design models and mapping of database
Disadvantages of EF:
If there is any schema change in database FE won't work and you have to update the schema in solution as well.
The EF queries are generated by the provider that we cannot control.
It is not good for a huge domain model.
Lazy loading is the main drawbacks of EF but it can be handled by doing eager loading upto certain extent but note that eager loading is not the answer to all the problems.