The word "truck" possibly derives from the Greek "trochos" (τροχός = wheel). In North America, certain kinds of big wheels were called trucks. When internal combustion-powered trucks came into use, they were called "motor trucks", possibly to avoid confusing them with the railroad usage of the word truck.

In the United States and Canada "truck" is usually reserved for commercial vehicles larger than normal cars, and for pickups and other vehicles having an open load bed.

In the United Kingdom and Ireland, lorry is used instead of truck, but only used for the medium and heavy types (see below); i.e. a van or an off-road four-wheel drive vehicle such as a Jeep may rarely be called a truck in the United States, but would never be regarded as a lorry in the UK or Ireland. The same applies to the initials HGV (for Heavy Goods Vehicle), which is basically synonymous with lorry. What the Americans call a station wagon (a type of automobile) is called an estate car in the UK.

In U.S. English, the word "truck" is often preceded by a word describing the type of vehicle, such as a "fire truck" or "tanker truck". Note that in British English these would be referred to as "fire engine" and "tanker" or "petrol tanker", respectively. In Canada "fire engine" is also used.

"Lorry" is also used in Hong Kong.

The word "lorry" is also used in Cambodia, although there it can refer to a train.

In Australia and New Zealand, a pickup truck (a relatively small, usually car- or van-derived vehicle, with an open back body) is usually called a ute (short for "utility"), and the word "truck" or "lorry" is mostly reserved for larger vehicles. The small utility truck was invented in Australia in the 1930s.

Other languages have loanwords based on these terms, such as the Malay language and the Spanish language in northern Mexico.

A commonly understood term for truck across many European countries is camion. Camion is also used in Quebec to identify trucks in French. Additionally, from the German language the initials "Pkw" (Personenkraftwagen or passenger power vehicle) for a car and "Lkw" (Lastkraftwagen or cargo/load/freight power vehicle) for larger trucks are understood. Vans and small trucks are called "Transporter".

Nordic languages use a term similar to the German one: Lastbil (Danish and Swedish), Lastebil (Norwegian) and Vörubíll (Icelandic), which all roughly translates to "load car". It should be noted that the loanword "truck" in these languages normally refers to a forklift.