What is the Difference Between SharePoint2010 List and Library?

SharePoint 2010 Lists and Libraries Overview

List Description

The SharePoint lists are like SQL Data Tables and these List stores the same kind of content. The List contains the list fields, list properties and list columns.

The List item can have attachment (one or many) But List does not support Check in and Check out operations. 

Templates - List

Announcements

Calendar

Contacts

Tasks

Library Description

The SharePoint Library is a collection of files and it stores the documents and contains Library Fields, Library Properties and  Library Columns.

Library item can associated with file.(not multiple). The Library does support Check in and Check out operations.

Templates - Library

Document library

Form Library

Picture library

slide library

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lthough in most of the UI and API they can be manipulated the same way, there are some significant differences between Lists and Libraries. The latter is a specialized type of the former.

Lists:

• Can have attachments
• Have major versions only
• Do not have Check-in/Check-out features

Libraries:

• Cannot have attachments (files are directly in the library)
• Have both minor (draft) and major (published) versioning
• Have Check-in/Check-Out
• Publishing Libraries can use Page Layouts
• Have Unique Document Ids out of the box

In code, you can always obtain an SPList from a SPDocumentLibrary but not the other way around.

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Difference between Sharepoint Document Library and List

I was just wondering what could be main difference between these two guy:


Library: It store document/files.
List: It store data in table structure.


Library: It has versioning concept.
List: As it store only data, it doesn't have versioning concept.


Library: Think in terms of folder in your computer which store only files/images/pdf/media files.
List: Think in term of MS Excel and MS Access database; which store only data and not (Physical) file.