Recently, colloidal dispersions made from mixtures of solid and liquid lipids were described to combine controlled release characteristics with higher drug loading capacities than solid lipid nanoparticles (SLN). It has been proposed that these nanostructured lipid carriers (NLC) are composed of oily droplets which solubilize the drug and which are embedded in a solid lipid matrix. The structures of SLN and NLC based on glyceryl behenate and medium chain triglycerides were characterized by photon correlation spectroscopy (PCS) and laser diffraction (LD), field-flow fractionation (FFF) with multi-angle light scattering detection (MALS), and cryo transmission electron microscopy (cryo TEM). PCS indicates that SLN and NLC differ from a nanoemulsion with respect to Brownian motion due to asymmetric particle shapes. Non-spherical particles, in case of SLN and NLC, lead to higher polydispersity indices compared to the nanoemulsion. In FFF, the nanodroplets elute much earlier than SLN- and NLC-platelets although their PCS and LD data show similar particle sizes. In TEM platelet (for SLN), oil loaded platelet ("nanospoons"; for NLC) and droplet (for nanoemulsion) structures were observed. In contrast to literature reports, the investigated SLN appear as thin platelets. NLC are found to be lipid platelets with oil spots sticking on the surface. Very short diffusion pathways in platelets, increased water-lipid interfaces and low drug incorporation in crystalline lipids are the drawback of SLN and NLC compared to conventional nanoemulsions.