A network is an interconnection of devices that allows communication between them to share network resources. There are different types of networks including local area networks (LANs) that connect devices within a small geographic area like a home or office, and wide area networks (WANs) that connect multiple LANs across cities or countries. Network devices like hubs, switches, and routers help facilitate this connectivity, with switches improving on hubs by only sending traffic to the intended recipient device to avoid congestion. Various cable types like coaxial, twisted pair, and fiber optic are used to physically connect the network devices and components.