Chart of Accounts

Typically accounts are arranged as a tree, in heirarchical form. The main trunks represent entire categories or groups, while the leaves of the tree denote individual bank accounts or expense categories. When a summary report is requested, typically only the main branches are shown in the report, not each of the individual accounts. For example, a chart of accounts might look like the following:
        300             Expenses
         |
         +--310         Living Expenses
         |   |
         |   +--311     Beer
         |   |
         |   +--312     Cable
         |
         +--320         Business Expenses
         |   |
         |   +--321     8-inch Floppies
         |   |
         :   :
Note that accounts are coded: when a report is generated, the sort order is determined entirely by the numbering. By tradition and common practice, accounts that are not leaf accounts have a number that ends in zero; each higher level has one more zero in the account code.

When you create a new account, GnuCash offers a guess at what it thinks the account code might be; you are free to change this. GnuCash does not prevent duplicate numbering, although you are encouraged to avoid this. Account codes are treated as numbers, base-36: thus, if you run out of numbers, you can use the letters, a through z.

A Bigger Example

A "typical" chart of accounts is shown below. Each account is of a given account type. This example is a combination of some typical business and personal accounts.