Table-related commands in STATA

Abbreviations of commands

table	(no abbv.)
tabulate	ta tab
tabstat	(no abbv.)
summarize	su

Differences between table, tabulate, tabstat, summarize

	one-way	two-way	options
table	table v1 create a one-way table of v1 with simple statistics	table v1 v2 create a two-way table of v1 in row† and v2 in column†	,statistics( )
tabulate	tabulate v1 create a one-way table of v1 with detailed statistics	tabulate v1 v2 create a two-way table with v1 in row† and v2 in column†	,chi2 Pearson's chi-squared test; *only for two-way ,summarize(v3) detailed statistics for v3
tabstat	tabstat v1 create a one-way table of v1 with detailed statistics	*no two- or multiple-way table	,statistics( ) ,by(v3) detailed statistics for each of v3
summarize	summarize v1 detailed statistics of v1	*no two- or multiple-way summary	,detail

† row = transverse direction, column = longitudinal direction

Sample data

Suppose we have such a dataset in STATA.

One-way

Summary of sex, a binary variable

table		Both reports frequency but tabulate is more detailed
tabulate
tabstat		Both reports mean but summarize is more detailed
summarize

Summary of data1, a continuous variable

table		Both reports frequency of each value, which does not make sense
tabulate
tabstat		Both reports mean but summarize is more detailed
summarize

Summary of SES, a categorical variable

table		Both reports frequency but tabulate is more detailed
tabulate
tabstat		Both reports mean but summarize is more detailed
summarize

One-way, multiple

table	*Does not create one-way multiple table
tabulate	*Does not create one-way multiple table
tabstat		Reports mean in row (transverse) direction
summarize		Reports more details in column (longitudinal) direction