What is the difference between country and empire?

the british empire had Lost of Countries

An empire as extensive military, political, and economic external influence whether that be formal or informal.

Mostly a country when it gobbles up other countries it ends up as an Empire. You may like to (like many others) replace 'country' with 'nation'. For me the term 'nation' is so well-worn out that it mostly lost the meaning of what it ought to connote.

The two terms don't necessarily have to be different. An empire will invade countries and establish governments which favor its economic, corporate, or strategic interest.

An empire is many countries ruled by one country.

England is one country in the UK.

The British Empire stretched from the USA to China.

A Country is a Country, an empire is an Empire.

Mostly, it's a matter of labelling. A

If there is any rule, it would be that a country is a political entity inhabited by one nation, and an empire a political entity inhabited by several nations. There are exceptions to this - Japan is a single-nation empire, for example. In their case, however, the fact that Japan is generally referred to as an Empire may be down to the way that the Japanese word Tenno was translated by the first outsiders to arrive there.

It is also the case that an Empire MUST be ruled by a single person (though that person's function may be simply titular), whereas a Country can have an sort of government. Indeed, in retrospect the definition I gave above is the difference between a KINGDOM and an Empire. Go figure.

As nouns the difference between empire and country is that empire is a political unit having an extensive territory or comprising a number of territories or nations and ruled by a single supreme authority while country is (label) an area of land; a district, region.

Country is a term shortened from countryside which is just a fancy way of saying the land. It refers to the place which is unique from other places and is inhabited by a certain group of people, separated by geographical divisions such as mountains, deserts, or forests. An empire usually incorporates several countries and different peoples and is ruled by an emperor. It is much larger than other kingdoms or lands.