Eli5: What is the real difference between analog and digital?

Question

I tried looking it up, and my brain just wasn’t making sense of it, but I haven’t had coffee yet so.

In: 0

Answer 1

The term your looking for is discrete quantization. A digital value has discrete states like a flight of stairs. You are on the 9th step of a flight of 50 stairs. If you want to increase your value there is a defined exact defined minimum amount to go up to an increment to step 10. Analog or continuous values are like a wheelchair ramp. You are a fifth of the way up the ramp, you could go any value up, any amount a hundredth of an inch or 10 feet.