Difference apply from vs apply plugin

Question

Is there a difference except that:

apply from: - gets the (plugin).gradle from a URL

apply plugin: - gets the (plugin).gradle from the gradle plugin server

Answer 1

The actual difference between apply from: and apply plugin: is that the former is to be used for script plugins given a path to the local file system or a URL to a remote location, and the latter is used for binary plugins using the plugin id.

You can read more about it in Gradle documentation here.

Answer 2

apply from:

• calls the script directly as if it was part of the build file

See https://docs.gradle.org/current/userguide/plugins.html#sec:script_plugins

apply plugin:

• calls the Plugin.apply() interface

See https://docs.gradle.org/current/userguide/plugins.html#sec:binary_plugins