What’s the difference between an abstract and a summary?

An abstract concisely explains all the key points of an academic text such as a thesis, dissertation or journal article. It should summarize the whole text, not just introduce it.

An abstract is a type of summary, but summaries are also written elsewhere in academic writing. For example, you might summarize a source in a paper, in a literature review, or as a standalone assignment.

All can be done within seconds with our free text summarizer.