HTML.ActionLink vs Url.Action in ASP.NET Razor

Html.ActionLink generates an <a href=".."></a> tag whereas Url.Action returns only an url.

For example:

@Html.ActionLink("link text", "someaction", "somecontroller", new { id = "123" }, null)

generates:

<a href="/somecontroller/someaction/123">link text</a>

and Url.Action("someaction", "somecontroller", new { id = "123" }) 

generates:

/somecontroller/someaction/123