> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://docs.zero.inc/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://docs.zero.inc/getting-started/key-concepts.md).

# Key concepts

Four ideas carry the rest of the product. Once records, lists, views and deals make sense, agents, reports and the API stop being surprising.

**Records** are the data — every company, contact and deal in your workspace, with standard properties plus any [custom properties](/settings/custom-properties.md) you add. A record exists once, no matter how many lists it appears in.

**Lists** group records of one type. A **Regular list** holds what you (or an agent) put in it. A **Dynamic list** holds whatever currently matches its filters.

**Views** sit on top of a list and change only how you look at it — layout (**Grid** or **Board**), filters, grouping, visible properties, sorting, highlights. That is why one deal list can carry a pipeline board and a focused outreach grid at the same time.

**Deals** are the records that move. Each one belongs to a pipeline and sits in a stage, and advancing that stage is what feeds your boards, forecasts and reports. Track revenue as deal records rather than as a status on the company — the [Deals](/getting-started/key-concepts/records/deals.md) page explains why. Pipelines and stages live in **Settings → Workspace → Pipelines** (see [Pipelines](/settings/pipeline-stages.md)).

Read on: [Records](/getting-started/key-concepts/records.md) for what a record holds and how records relate, [Lists](/getting-started/key-concepts/lists.md) for segmenting, [Views](/getting-started/key-concepts/views.md) for cuts of the same data, [Deals](/getting-started/key-concepts/records/deals.md) for pipelines.


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