UILabel UITextField UITextView

Question

What's the fundamental difference between them?

Is a UITextField that's not editable is effectively a UILabel?

Are those essentially the same?

Answer 1

• UILabel: "The UILabel class implements a read-only text view."
• UITextField: "A UITextField object is a control that displays editable text and sends an action message to a target object when the user presses the return button."
• UITextView: "The UITextView class implements the behavior for a scrollable, multiline text region."

So:

• labels are read-only
• textfields are editable, and provide horizontal character seeking (not really scrolling) when the text is too long to display all at once. Generally used to input short text.
• textviews are also editable, but provide vertical scrolling when the text is too long to display all at one.

Answer 2

In addition to the above answers, UITextView has selectable text. This means that you can copy it or get the device to speak the text.