What is a ledger in Accounting

 A group of accounts is known as a ledger the consolidated view of the similar transactions different accounts are prepared in the ledger As we know, the journal records all business transactions separately and date-wise. The transactions pertaining to a particular person, assets, expense or income are recorded at different places in the journal and they occur on different dates. Hence, the journal fails to bring similar transactions together at one place. Thus to have a consolidated view of the similar transactions different accounts are prepared in the ledger. A ledger account may be defined as a summary statement of all the transactions relating to a person, assets, expenses or income which have taken place during a given period of time and show their net effect.

A group of accounts is known as a ledger. The general ledger is the main book of accounts it contains an account for each asset, liability, proprietorship, revenue, and expense account. The ledger contains the same information as the journal. However, in the journal, each transaction is completely recorded as a unit. The entire effect of a transaction is completely recorded in one place in the journal. Periodically the same information is posted to the ledger where it is accumulated according to individual items. The ledger includes all the basic accounts needed for the preparation of the financial statements.

A journal is maintained only to facilitate the passing of entries in the ledger, so every entry recorded in the journal must be posted into the ledger. A ledger is a register having a number of pages that are numbered consecutively. One account is usually assigned one page in the ledger. However, if the transactions, pertaining to a particular account are more, it may be assigned more than one page in the ledger. An index of various accounts opened in the ledger is given at the beginning of the ledger for the purpose of easy reference. It is the principal book of accounts because it helps us in achieving the objective of accounting.