What is "answering machine"

n. A device that automatically records voice mail from unanswered telephone calls.

n. an electronic device that answers the telephone and records messages

The answering machine, answerphone or message machine, also known as the telephone answering machine (or TAM) in the UK and some Commonwealth countries, ansaphone or ansafone (from a trade name), or telephone answering device (TAD), is used for answering telephones and recording callers' messages.

Unlike voicemail, which can be a centralized or networked system that covers, and mostly extends, similar functions, an answering machine is set up in the user's premises alongside — or incorporated within — the user's land-line telephone. Unlike operator messaging the caller does not talk to a human.

As land lines become less important, due to the shift to cell phone technology, and as unified communications matures, the installed base of TADs is shrinking.

An answering machine is a device for automatically answering telephone calls and recording messages left by callers.

Answering Machine may also refer to:

• question answering machine.
• The Answering Machine, a British indie band from Manchester
• The Answer Machine?, eighth full-length album by British folk metal band Skyclad
• Answering Machine Music, a 1999 album by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone
• "Answering Machine", a song by The Replacements from the 1984 album Let It Be
• "The Answering Machine", a song by Marillion from the 1998 album Radiation
• "Answering Machine", a song by Cherry Poppin' Daddies from the 1990 album Ferociously Stoned
• "Answering Machine", a song by Rupert Holmes