A business object, or simply an object, represents an element of the business for which some information needs to be maintained. Examples of business objects: customers, accounts, orders, payments, etc. A number of facts usually need to be registered for an object. For example, an order may have the placement date, customer, line items, shipment address, shipment date, shipment number, delivery instructions, order status, etc. Each of such facts is represented by a separate attribute.

An advanced variant of a business object is called an intelligent business object.