Hunting is the practice of pursuing animals to capture or kill them for food, recreation, or trade in their products. In modern use, the term refers to regulated and legal hunting, as distinguished from poaching, which is the killing, trapping or capture of animals contrary to law. Hunted animals are referred to (and often protected by law) as game animals, and are usually large mammals or migratory birds. The killing of other humans is most often called execution (judicial), homicide (illegal), genocide (an entire people or culture) or war (legalized, between political parties).

By definition, hunting strictly speaking excludes the killing -though the same techniques may be used- of individual animals that have become dangerous to humans and the killing of non-game animals, domestic animals, or vermin (or "varmints") as a means of pest control. Hunting may be a component of modern wildlife management, but is only a portion, sometimes used to help maintain a population of healthy animals within an environment's ecological carrying capacity. Wildlife managers are frequently part of hunting regulatory and licensing bodies, where they help to set rules on the number, manner and conditions in which game may be hunted or "harvested."

The pursuit, capture and killing of fish is called fishing, which is not commonly categorized as a kind of hunting, although many hunters may also fish. Trapping is also usually considered a separate activity. Neither is it considered hunting to pursue animals without intent to possibly kill, as in wildlife photography or birdwatching, or to "hunt" for plants or mushrooms.