An accountant is the name given to a practitioner or accountancy, a person who is involved in all aspects of measurement, disclosure, and provision of assurance about financial information. Accountants can be found all over the world, employed in a variety of commerce, industry, and auditing operations.
There are a number of different jobs which can be performed by an accountant, depending on where they are working and how they are employed. For example, at the same time as accountants in Berlin are working for the German tax department, there may also be accountants in London working to help investors and managers save as much tax as possible. Depending on the local jurisdiction, there are a range of different categories of accountants, including chartered accountants, international accountants, tax accountants, and many more.

Accounting is defined in slightly different ways around the world, although the services performed by accountants are much the same. In the early days, accountants were used mainly to assist business people with the recording or financial information, and this is still the primary purpose of accountants around the world today. However, the development of more complex business operations and procedures slowly gave birth to more complex methods of accountancy, such as double entry bookkeeping which was developed in the 14th century. Some of the additional complexities which were introduced around this time had to do with the existence of multiple investors, along with joint stock companies and other more complex business arrangements that were being introduced during this time.

Along with a number of accountants who work directly with businesses around the world, there are also many accountants who work directly with individuals with regard to personal taxation. Whether they are working for the government, businesses, or individuals, tax accountants are a large part of the accountancy industry. Accountancy that provides information to people outside of a business setting is called financial accounting. In contrast, accountancy that is concerned with business is called management accounting, and it is used to provide financial information to employees, managers, and auditors. No matter what speciality an accountant has however, and whether he or she works with business entities or not, the majority of services offered by accountants are related to the measurement and reporting of financial information.