What is the difference between application server and web server?

ApplicationServer: takes care of Security, Transaction, Multithreading, Resource pooling, load balancing, clustering, performence, highly availability, scalability, etc. Exposes business logic to client applications through various protocols, possibly including HTTP. Supports deployment of .war and .ear filesApplication server = webserver + EJB container.

Webserver: handles HTTP protocol. Receives HTTP request, it responds with an HTTP response.