Hello,

They are almost the same but they are used in different workflows:

Strand Groups are commonly used to isolate the effect of an operator to a group of guides, those groups contain integer values (0,1,2,3...).

Guide channels use integer, decimal values (0, 1, 1.25, 1.50, etc) and vertex color information, they can be used as multiplier value for a lot of Ox attributes. For example, if you have a RenderSettings operator and you want to have different strand thickness you can create a guide channel and assign different values or colors to guides in a single channel. Another example is if you want more or less hair distribution in certain areas you can create a guide channel with values from 0+ where 0 is cero hair distribution, or use the paint brush to paint black and white values on the guides, then connect this guide channel to the multiplier channel in HairFromGuides. Those are two simple examples but you can do a lot more. You can find more information about guide channels HERE.

Jeordanis Figuereo (Product Designer. EPHERE Inc.)