Difference between Information and Knowledge

Definition of Information

The term ‘information’ is described as the structured, organised and processed data, presented within context, which makes it relevant and useful to the person who wants it. Data means raw facts and figures concerning people, places, or any other thing, which is expressed in the form of numbers, letters or symbols.

Information is the data which is transformed and classified into an intelligible form, which can be used in the process of decision making. In short, when data turn out to be meaningful after conversion, it is known as information. It is something that informs, in essence, it gives an answer to a particular question.

The main characteristics of information are accuracy, relevance, completeness and availability. It can be communicated in the form of content of a message or through observation and can be obtained from various sources such as newspaper, television, internet, people, books, and so on.

Definition of Knowledge

Knowledge means the familiarity and awareness of a person, place, events, ideas, issues, ways of doing things or anything else, which is gathered through learning, perceiving or discovering. It is the state of knowing something with cognizance through the understanding of concepts, study and experience.

In a nutshell, knowledge connotes the confident theoretical or practical understanding of an entity along with the capability of using it for a specific purpose. Combination of information, experience and intuition leads to knowledge which has the potential to draw inferences and develop insights, based on our experience and thus it can assist in decision making and taking actions.

Comparison Chart

BASIS FOR COMPARISONINFORMATIONKNOWLEDGEMeaningWhen the facts obtained are systematically presented in a given context it is known as information.Knowledge refers to the relevant and objective information gained through experience.What is it?Refined dataUseful informationCombination ofData and contextInformation, experience and intuitionProcessingImproves representationIncreases concisousnessOutcomeComprehensionUnderstandingTransferEasily transferableRequires learningReproducibilityCan be reproduced.Identical reproduction is not possible.PredictionInformation alone is not sufficient to make predictionsPrediction is possible if one possess required knowledge.One in otherAll information need not be knowledge.