A lathe is a machine tool that mainly uses a turning tool to turn a rotating workpiece.

When the lathe is working, the workpiece rotates, and the tool is fixed and moves longitudinally and horizontally to process circles and surfaces. Lathes can be used to process various rotary forming surfaces, such as: internal and external cylindrical surfaces, internal and external conical surfaces, internal and external threads, end faces, grooves, knurling, etc. Drills, reamer drills, reamers, taps, dies and knurling tools can also be used on lathes for corresponding processing

Lathes are the most important type of cutting machine tools among metal cutting machine tools. In general machine manufacturing factories, lathes are the most numerous and are also called machine tools.