What are the differences between ng-repeat and ng-options and why do they not behave the same way?

Question

How do ng-options and ng-repeat differ?

In the following code, I have an ng-repeat that iterates through a list of people:

Answer 1

From the documentation:

Note: ngOptions provides an iterator facility for the element which should be used instead of ngRepeat when you want the select model to be bound to a non-string value. This is because an option element can only be bound to string values at present.

This fiddle makes the point more clear: select2 will bind to select 1 but not the other way around. Click the buttons and the reason will reveal itself :-)

HTML

  
    
      {{obj.name}}
    
  
  
  
  selected: {{selectedPerson}} {{typeofSelectedPerson()}}
    Jao
    Ze

JS

function MyCtrl($scope){
    $scope.selectedPerson = 1;
    $scope.people = [
        {
            id: 1,
            name: 'Ze'
        },
        {
            id: 2,
            name: 'Jao'
        }
    ];

    $scope.typeofSelectedPerson = function(){
        return typeof $scope.selectedPerson;
    }
}