Short-circuit evaluation is a process whereby the value of an expression is determined without evaluating all of the operands and/or operators.

C# offers both short-circuiting and non-short-circuiting boolean operators (Shamseer, 2017):

1. short-circuiting operators
   1. conditional OR, ||
   2. conditional AND, &&
2. non-short-circuiting operators
   1. logical OR, |
   2. logical AND, &

Here is an example demonstrating the differences between them

bool Condition1()
{
    Console.WriteLine("\tCondition 1 is evaluated");
    return false;
}

bool Condition2()
{
    Console.WriteLine("\tCondition 2 is evaluated");
    return true;
}

Console.WriteLine("--- Conditional operators");
Console.WriteLine();
Console.WriteLine("Condition1() && Condition2()");
if (Condition1() && Condition2())
{
    // only Condition 1 is evaluated
}
Console.WriteLine();
Console.WriteLine("Condition2() || Condition1()");
if (Condition2() || Condition1())
{
    // only Condition 2 is evaluated
}
Console.WriteLine();
Console.WriteLine("Condition1() || Condition2()");
if (Condition1() || Condition2())
{
    // both are evaluated
}
Console.WriteLine();
Console.WriteLine("--- Logical operators");
Console.WriteLine();
Console.WriteLine("Condition1() & Condition2()");
if (Condition1() & Condition2())
{
    // only Condition 1 is evaluated
}
Console.WriteLine();
Console.WriteLine("Condition1() | Condition2()");
if (Condition1() | Condition2())
{
    // both are evaluated
}

The output:

Condition1() returns false, while Condition2() returns true

--- Conditional operators

Condition1() && Condition2()
  Condition 1 is evaluated

Condition2() || Condition1()
  Condition 2 is evaluated

Condition1() || Condition2()
  Condition 1 is evaluated
  Condition 2 is evaluated

--- Logical operators

Condition1() & Condition2()
  Condition 1 is evaluated
  Condition 2 is evaluated

Condition1() | Condition2()
  Condition 1 is evaluated
  Condition 2 is evaluated

Live-code example

References

1. Shamseer. (2017, January 19). Short-Circuit Evaluation In C#. Retrieved from https://www.c-sharpcorner.com/article/short-circuit-evaluation-in-c-sharp/