This paper deals with the coherent and the incoherent microdiffraction, as well as their applications, for example, determination of the nature of defects and boundaries, measurement of the strain field and identification of the symmetry, etc. The localized structure information obtained from microdiffraction has been compared with and complements that provided by HREM. Microsc. Res. Tech. 40:122–135, 1998. © 1998 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.