What's the difference between
and
Enter two words to compare and contrast their definitions, origins, and synonyms to better understand how those words are related.

Drone vs Droid - What's the difference?

drone | droid |

As nouns the difference between drone and droid

is that drone is a male bee or wasp, which does not work but can fertilise the queen while droid is a robot, especially one made with some physical resemblance to a human.

As a verb drone

is to produce a low-pitched hum or buzz.

drone

English

(wikipedia drone)

Etymology 1

From (etyl) drone, from (etyl) . In sense "unmanned aircraft", due to early military UAVs dumbly flying on preset paths. Flying Robots 101: Everything You Need To Know About Drones, Kelsey D. Atherton, March 7, 2013

Noun

(en noun)
  • A male bee or wasp, which does not work but can fertilise the queen.
  • * Dryden
  • All with united force combine to drive / The lazy drones from the laborious hive.
  • Someone who doesn't work; a lazy person, an idler.
  • * 1624 , John Smith, Generall Historie , in Kupperman 1988, p. 117:
  • he that gathereth not every day as much as I doe, the next day shall be set beyond the river, and be banished from the Fort as a drone , till he amend his conditions or starve.
  • * Burton
  • By living as a drone , to be an unprofitable and unworthy member of so noble and learned a society.
  • A remotely controlled aircraft, an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV).
  • * {{quote-magazine, title=An internet of airborne things, date=2012-12-01, volume=405, issue=8813, page=3 (Technology Quarterly), magazine= citation
  • , passage=A farmer could place an order for a new tractor part by text message and pay for it by mobile money-transfer. A supplier many miles away would then take the part to the local matternet station for airborne dispatch via drone .}}
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-07, author= Ed Pilkington
  • , volume=188, issue=26, page=6, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= ‘Killer robots’ should be banned in advance, UN told , passage=In his submission to the UN, [Christof] Heyns points to the experience of drones . Unmanned aerial vehicles were intended initially only for surveillance, and their use for offensive purposes was prohibited, yet once strategists realised their perceived advantages as a means of carrying out targeted killings, all objections were swept out of the way.}}
    Strikes from drones take many innocent lives.
    Usage notes
    In sense "unmanned aircraft", primarily used informally of military aircraft or consumer radio controlled quadcopters, without precise definition.
    Hyponyms
    *Predator drone *Reaper drone
    See also
    * UAV

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl) .

    Verb

    (dron)
  • To produce a low-pitched hum or buzz.
  • To speak in a monotone way.
  • Noun

    (en noun)
  • A low-pitched hum or buzz.
  • * 1908 ,
  • He chanted as he flew and the car responded with sonorous drone .
  • (rft-sense) One who performs menial or tedious work; a drudge.
  • One of the fixed-pitch pipes on a bagpipe.
  • A genre of music similar to that of noise.
  • A humming or deep murmuring sound.
  • * Longfellow
  • The monotonous drone of the wheel.

    References

    Anagrams

    * ----

    droid

    English

    (wikipedia droid)

    Alternative forms

    * 'droid

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A robot, especially one made with some physical resemblance to a human.
  • * {{quote-magazine
  • , year = 1952 , date = July , first = Mari , last = Wolf , authorlink = , title = Robots of the World! Arise! , url = http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31611 , magazine = , volume = 1 , issue = 3 , page = 76 , passage = It's crazy. They're swarming all over Carron City. They're stopping robots in the streets—household Robs, commercial Droids , all of them. They just look at them, and then the others quit work and start off with them. }}
  • * 1976 , , Star Wars: From the Adventures of Luke Skywalker , New York: Ballantine Books, p 77:
  • “These aren’t the ’droids you’re looking for,” Kenobi told him pleasantly.
  • * 1995 , J. D. Robb, Glory in Death , page 39:
  • The bartender was a droid , as most were, but she doubted this one had been programmed to listen cheerfully to customers' hard luck stories.

    Anagrams

    *