Machine learning is a subset of artificial intelligence (AI) that focuses on developing algorithms and statistical models that enable computers to learn from and make predictions or decisions based on data. Unlike traditional programming, where explicit instructions are given, machine learning algorithms identify patterns in data and improve their performance over time as they are exposed to more information. It is widely used across various industries, including finance, healthcare, and technology, for tasks like classification, regression, and clustering, and has become a cornerstone in areas such as speech recognition, image analysis, and predictive analytics.