Both boxing and unboxing are wanted devils. While the boxing process occurs, there is an additional memory loss occurrence. This memory is actually needed for pointer to virtual method and pointer to sync table which is not there in the case of value type objects.

During the unboxing process, however, memory relaxation occurs, but at the same time some unwanted checking (like whether the reference type variable is not Null or it is a valid boxed value or not) takes place.

If we compare Reference type and Value type Objects, then we certainly prefer Value Type objects. This is because as Reference types are coming from the managed heap/memory, they used to affect the Garbage Collection and memory management. On other hand, since Value types run on thread’s stack there is no need to be worried for a garbage collection to occur for them.

So, for these reasons we should avoid unnecessary boxing/unboxing processes and only add them when the application demands it. However, the fact remains that most of the developers are not aware of the underlying complications and they repeat these unnecessary processes unknowingly, which can lead to the degradation of the performance.