下面是一个例子，它精确地显示了struct和class之间的区别。

在操场上写的代码的截图

struct Radio1{
    var name:String
    //    init(name:String) {
    //        self.name = name
    //    }
}

struct Car1{
    var radio:Radio1?
    var model:String

}

var i1 = Car1(radio: Radio1(name:"murphy"),model:"sedan")
var i2 = i1
//since car instance i1 is a struct and 
//this car has every member as struct ,
//all values are copied into i2

i2.radio?.name //murphy
i2.radio = Radio1(name: "alpha")
i2.radio?.name //alpha

i1.radio?.name //murphy

//since Radio1 was struct , 
//values were copied and thus
// changing name  of instance of Radio1 in i2 
//did not bring change in i1

class Radio2{
    var name:String
    init(name:String) {
        self.name = name
    }
}

struct Car2{
    var radio:Radio2?
    var model:String

}
var i3 = Car2(radio: Radio2(name:"murphy"),model:"sedan")
//var radioInstance = Radio2(name: "murphy")
//var i3 = Car2(radio: radioInstance,model:"sedan")

var i4 = i3
//since i3 is instance of struct
//everything is copied to i4 including reference of instance of Radio2
//because Radio2 is a class



i4.radio?.name //murphy
i4.radio?.name="alpha"
i4.radio?.name //alpha

i3.radio?.name //alpha

//since Radio2 was class, 
//reference was copied and 
//thus changing name of instance 
//of Radio2 in i4 did  bring change in i3 too


//i4.radio?.name
//i4.radio = Radio2(name: "alpha")
//i4.radio?.name
//
//i3.radio?.name

Struct是值类型。这意味着，如果你将结构的实例复制到另一个变量，它只是复制到变量。

值类型示例

struct Resolution {
    var width = 2
    var height = 3
}

let hd = Resolution(width: 1920, height: 1080)
var cinema = hd //assigning struct instance  to variable
println("Width of cinema instance is \(cinema.width)")//result is 1920
println("Width of hd instance is \(hd.width)")//result is 1920

cinema.width = 2048

println("Width of cinema instance is \(cinema.width)")//result is 2048
println("Width of hd instance is \(hd.width)")//result is 1920

类是引用类型。这意味着如果将类的一个实例赋值给一个变量，它将只保存对该实例的引用，而不是副本。

已经有很多关于这方面的文章了，我想在这里加一个类比。希望你看完这篇文章后，心中永远不会再有疑虑: 底线: 类通过引用传递，而结构通过值传递。

假设你和你的朋友共享一个谷歌文档表。现在，如果他改变了其中的任何内容，你也会在谷歌文档上看到变化，这意味着你的副本也受到了影响。 这基本上是“通过引用传递”。

但假设，如果你有一个。xls文件保存在你的机器。你把那份文件交给你的朋友。现在，如果他在那个文件中做了任何更改，你的文件也不会被打乱/影响，因为你有自己的副本。 这基本上就是“按值传递”。 你有多个简单的程序已经在那里检查这个类比在快速操场。

如果你仔细看苹果手册，你会看到这部分: 结构和枚举是值类型

在本节中，你会看到:

“​let​ ​hd​ = ​Resolution​(​width​: ​1920​, ​height​: ​1080​) ​var​ ​cinema​ = ​hd This example declares a constant called hd and sets it to a Resolution instance initialized with the width and height of full HD video (1920 pixels wide by 1080 pixels high). It then declares a variable called cinema and sets it to the current value of hd. Because Resolution is a structure, a copy of the existing instance is made, and this new copy is assigned to cinema. Even though hd and cinema now have the same width and height, they are two completely different instances behind the scenes. Next, the width property of cinema is amended to be the width of the slightly-wider 2K standard used for digital cinema projection (2048 pixels wide and 1080 pixels high): ​cinema​.​width​ = ​2048 Checking the width property of cinema shows that it has indeed changed to be 2048: ​println​(​"cinema is now ​(​cinema​.​width​)​ pixels wide"​) ​// prints "cinema is now 2048 pixels wide However, the width property of the original hd instance still has the old value of 1920: println​(​"hd is still ​(​hd​.​width​)​ pixels wide"​) // prints "hd is still 1920 pixels wide” When cinema was given the current value of hd, the values stored in hd were copied into the new cinema instance. The end result is two completely separate instances, which just happened to contain the same numeric values. Because they are separate instances, setting the width of cinema to 2048 doesn’t affect the width stored in hd.” Excerpt From: Apple Inc. “The Swift Programming Language.” iBooks. https://itun.es/us/jEUH0.l

这是结构体和类之间最大的区别。复制结构，引用类。

以上答案都是正确的，我希望我的回答能帮助到那些不理解以上答案的人。

在Swift中有两种类型的对象

结构体 类

它们之间的主要区别是

Struct是值类型 类是引用类型

例如这里的代码要理解得很好。

struct SomeStruct {
var a : Int;

init(_ a : Int) {
    self.a = a
}
}

class SomeClass {
var a: Int;

init(_ a: Int) {
    self.a = a
}

}
var x = 11

var someStruct1 = SomeStruct(x)
var someClass1 = SomeClass(x)

var someStruct2 = someStruct1
var someClass2 = someClass1

someClass1.a = 12
someClass2.a // answer is 12 because it is referencing to class 1     property a

someStruct1.a = 14
someStruct2.a // answer is 11 because it is just copying it not referencing it

这是主要的区别，但我们也有次要的区别。

类

必须声明初始化式(构造函数) 有deinitialisers 可以从其他类继承吗

结构体

它为你提供了自由初始化器，你不必声明初始化器，如果你声明了自由初始化器，它将被你声明的初始化器覆盖 没有去初始化 不能从其他结构继承

正如许多人已经指出复制结构体和类的区别一样，这可以从它们在c语言中的来源来理解，像这样的结构体

struct A {
    let a: Int
    let c: Bool
}

在func父对象或结构体的局部内存中，它将是这样的

64bit for int
8 bytes for bool

现在

class A {
    let a: Int
    let c: Bool
}

而不是存储在本地内存或结构或类中的数据内容，它将是一个单一指针

64bit address of class A instance

当你复制这两个时，很容易看出为什么会有区别，复制第一个，你复制了64位的int和8位的bool，复制第二个，你复制了64位的地址到A类的实例，你可以有同一个内存地址的多个副本，都指向同一个实例，但结构体的每个副本都将是它自己的副本。

现在事情变得复杂了因为你可以把这两个混合起来

struct A {
    let a: ClassA
    let c: Bool
}

你的记忆会是这样的

64bit address of class A instance
8 bytes for bool

This is a problem because even though you have multiple copies of the struct in your program, they all have a copy to the same object ClassA, this means just like multiples reference to instance ClassA you pass around have to have a reference count kept of how many reference to the object exists to know when to delete them, you program can have multiple references to struct A that need to keep a reference count to their ClassA instances, this can be time consuming if your struct has a lot of classes in them, or the structs it contains has lots of classes in them, now when you copy your struct, the compiler has to generate code that goes through every single class instance referenced in your struct and substructs, and increment there reference count to keep track of how many references there are. This can make classes much faster to pass around as you just need to copy its single address, and it won't need to increase the reference count of any of its children because it want reduce the reference count of any child it contains until its own reference count reaches 0.

The thing gets even more complicated with some Apple struct types, that they actually have object types in them, the good thing about data that is reference to, is it can be stored in memory and be lengthened and contractor at will and they can be very large, unlike data stored on local stack, so types like String, Array, Set, Dictionary though they act like struct and will even make a duplicate of there internal data if you try to modify them so you don't change all occurrence, there data still has to be reference counted and so a struct containing a lots of these types can still be slow, because the internal data for each one has to be retained.

当然，传递结构类型可以减少大量错误的可能性，但它们也会降低程序的速度，这取决于所包含的类型。