A recording medium and apparatus and method for managing defective areas are discussed. According to an embodiment, the method includes: (a) determining whether or not a real time recording is required; and (b) controlling a recording operation based on the determination such that (i) a defective block found during real time recording is not replace with a replacement block of a spare area, while storing a status information identifying that the defective block is not replaced, and (ii) a found defective block is replaced with a replacement block of the spare area if the real time recording is not required as a result of the determination, while storing a status information identifying that the defective block is replaced with the replacement block and storing a location of the replacement block.