What is the difference between Width and ActualWidth in WPF?

Width/Height is the requested or layout size. If you set to Auto, then the value is double.NaN when you access the property in code behind.

ActualWidth/ActualHeight and RenderSize.Width/RenderSize.Height both return the element's rendered size, as RenderSize is of type Size. If you want/need the actual size of the item, then use any of these attributes.

I find ActualWidth most useful when I want to bind the width or height of one element to another.

In this simple example I have two buttons arranged side by side and a comment underneath that is constrained to the width of the StackPanel containing the two buttons.

<StackPanel>    <StackPanel Margin="0,12,0,0" Orientation="Horizontal" Name="buttonPanel" HorizontalAlignment="Left" >         <Button Content="Yes - Arm the missile" FontWeight="Bold" HorizontalAlignment="Left"/>         <Button Content="No - Save the world" HorizontalAlignment="Left" Margin="7,0,0,0"/>    </StackPanel>    <TextBlock Text="Please choose whether you want to arm the missile and kill everybody, or save the world by deactivating the missile."                Width="{Binding Path=ActualWidth,ElementName=buttonPanel}" Margin="0,5,0,0" HorizontalAlignment="Left" TextWrapping="Wrap"/></StackPanel>

ActualWidth accounts for padding in the value so anytime you need to know that number you can call Actualwidth instead of width and avoid the calculation.

edit: removed Margin b/c it isn't part of ActualWidth.