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.

Library vs Archive - What's the difference?

library | archive |

As nouns the difference between library and archive

is that library is an institution which holds books and/or other forms of stored information for use by the public or qualified people. It is usual, but not a defining feature of a library, for it to be housed in rooms of a building, to lend items of its collection to members either with or without payment, and to provide various other services for its community of users while archive is a place for storing earlier, and often historical, material. An archive usually contains documents (letters, records, newspapers, etc.) or other types of media kept for historical interest.

As a verb archive is

to put into an archive.

library

English

(wikipedia library)

Noun

(libraries)
  • An institution which holds books and/or other forms of stored information for use by the public or qualified people. It is usual, but not a defining feature of a library, for it to be housed in rooms of a building, to lend items of its collection to members either with or without payment, and to provide various other services for its community of users.
  • A collection of books or other forms of stored information.
  • An equivalent collection of analogous information in a non-printed form, e.g. record library
  • (computer science) A collection of software subprograms that provides functionality, to be incorporated into or used by a computer program.
  • (card games) The deck or draw pile
  • A collection of DNA material from a single organism or relative to a single disease

    • Derived terms

    * Borgesian library * interlibrary * librarian * librarial * library and information science * library assistant * library catalog * library hand * library science * mobile library * record library * public library * school library

    See also

    * bookshop, bookstore, bookhouse False cognates and false friends in English 1000 English basic words

    archive

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A place for storing earlier, and often historical, material. An archive usually contains documents (letters, records, newspapers, etc.) or other types of media kept for historical interest.
  • The material so kept, considered as a whole (compare archives).
    • His archive of Old High German language texts is the most extensive in Britain.

    Derived terms

    () * archival * archivist * national archive

    Verb

    (archiv)
  • To put into an archive.
    • I was planning on archiving the documents from 2001.