How to properly encode links to external URL in MVC Razor

Question

This view suppose to show a list of hyperlinks, each pointing to an external URL. The goal is for the user to click one of these links and have their browser open a new tab with the selected URL. Currently I have the following markup: ``` @Html.ActionLink("SomeSite", "http://subdomain.mydomain.com/SomeSite") ``` This markup produces: ``` http://localhost:58980/AccessInstance/http%3a/subdomain.mydomain.com/SomeSite ``` instead of : ``` http://subdomain.mydomain.com/SomeSite ``` What can I change in my markup to make this work as I expect?

Accepted Answer

You don't need to use `@Html.ActionLink` for that. Just use a plain A tag: ``` SomeSite ``` `Html.ActionLink` is specifically for generating links to actions defined in MVC controllers, in the same app. Since you're linking to an absolute URL, you don't need any of the functionality that `Html.ActionLink` provides.

How to properly encode links to external URL in MVC Razor

Solution

Problem