Lightning App Builder versus the page layout editor
Key Takeaway
In Lightning Experience, ask how the record fields reach the page. If the page uses the Record Detail component, you change the fields in the page layout editor. If it uses Dynamic Forms, you change them in the Lightning App Builder.
Salesforce gives you two tools for arranging record pages: the page layout editor and the Lightning App Builder. The page layout editor controls which fields and buttons appear on a record page, along with its links and related lists. The Lightning App Builder builds Lightning Experience pages out of components. If you know which tool controls which part of a page, you know where to make a change.
Which pages each tool customizes
The page layout editor customizes Salesforce Classic record page layouts and some parts of Lightning record pages, depending on how the page is set up. The Lightning App Builder customizes Lightning Experience pages. For record pages, it can customize only Lightning record pages, not Salesforce Classic record pages. So if users work in Salesforce Classic, the page layout editor is the right tool.
Page layouts control the layout and organization of these items on object record pages:
- Buttons
- Fields
- S-controls
- Visualforce
- Custom links
- Related lists
Page layouts also help decide which fields are visible, read-only, and required.