What is Computer?

The word “Computer” is derived from the word “compute” which means to calculate. In the past, the computer was normally considered to be a calculating device used to perform artihmetic operations. But today, computer is used in every field of daily life to solve problems of different kinks. So computer can be defined as:

Computer is modern electronic machine that is used to solve different kinds of problems according to a set of instructions given to it.

OR
A computer is an electroinc machine that operates under the control of instructions, that accepts the input data, processes or manipulates the given data according to the predefined instructions and stores the result for future use. It can also retrieve the stored results as and when required again.

Now-a-days, data is processed with the help of computer. This modern technique to process data is known as Electronic Data Processing (EDP). Computer is also known as Electronic Data Processing machine. The term data processing means:

  • Arithmetic and logical operations on data to get required results.
  • To send and receive information from one location to another.
  • Arranging data into a specific order etc.


A computer can store, process and retrieve data as and when desired. The computer processes data with very high speed. In addition to being very fast, computer is also very accurate in calculations. These are the main capabilities of the computer.