What's the difference between guarantee and promise?

Guarantee


Definition:

  • (n.) In law and common usage: A promise to answer for the payment of some debt, or the performance of some duty, in case of the failure of another person, who is, in the first instance, liable to such payment or performance; an engagement which secures or insures another against a contingency; a warranty; a security. Same as Guaranty.
  • (n.) One who binds himself to see an undertaking of another performed; a guarantor.
  • (n.) The person to whom a guaranty is made; -- the correlative of guarantor.
  • (n.) In law and common usage: to undertake or engage for the payment of (a debt) or the performance of (a duty) by another person; to undertake to secure (a possession, right, claim, etc.) to another against a specified contingency, or at all avents; to give a guarantee concerning; to engage, assure, or secure as a thing that may be depended on; to warrant; as, to guarantee the execution of a treaty.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) We are pursuing legal action because there are still so many unanswered questions about the viability of Shenhua’s proposed koala plan and it seems at this point the plan does not guarantee the survival of the estimated 262 koalas currently living where Shenhua wants to put its mine,” said Ranclaud.
  • (2) On Friday, a spokesperson for China’s foreign ministry appeared to confirm those fears, telling reporters that the joint declaration, a deal negotiated by London and Beijing guaranteeing Hong Kong’s way of life for 50 years, “was a historical document that no longer had any practical significance”.
  • (3) The Labour MP urged David Cameron to guarantee that officers who give evidence over the alleged paedophile ring in Westminster will not be prosecuted.
  • (4) A new bill, to be published this week with the aim of turning it into law by next month, will allow the government to use Britain's low borrowing rates to guarantee the £40bn in infrastructure projects and £10bn for underwriting housing projects.
  • (5) The alignment of Clinton’s Iowa team, all but guaranteeing a declaration of her official campaign before the end of next month, was coming into view amid reports that she was due to address by the end of the week controversy over her use of a private email account as secretary of state.
  • (6) Moscovici added that France wants the summit to set up a eurozone banking union, which would take on responsibility for propping up failing banks and guarantee depositors' savings across the 17 countries.
  • (7) Simple reperfusion of the infarcted myocardium, however, does not necessarily guarantee myocardial salvage, and preliminary studies have been somewhat confusing as to its beneficial effects.
  • (8) Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband accepted the Tory idea of a royal charter to establish a new press regulatory body but insisted it be underpinned in statute and said there should be guarantees of the body's independence.
  • (9) As part of the plan, the treasury and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation will guarantee against the "possibility of unusually large losses" on up to $306bn of risky loans and securities backed by commercial and residential mortgages.
  • (10) 5-bromo-2'-deoxyuridine (BrdU) to oligonucleotide probes guaranteed the production of labelled probes of 100% specific activity that gave consistent, reproducible results, within hours, in a rapid in situ hybridization (ISH) technique.
  • (11) Production of the vaccine basically consists in the multiplication of the working seed under standardized, well-defined conditions guaranteeing consistency of the vaccine lots.
  • (12) But he says it does not guarantee a return to sustained growth because of global forces beyond its control.
  • (13) In any halfway-awake western nation, and, to be frank, in many reaches of British national life, this would be considered an amateurish absurdity, a guarantee of eventual failure.
  • (14) The brewery kept winning trophies at the Australian International Beer Awards year in, year out, yet its head brewer refused to send beer east until he could guarantee refrigerated transport.
  • (15) The U.S. also needs significant regulatory and financial support, including "billions in loan guarantees," the report said.
  • (16) The content of vitamin A in the calf-rearing milk feed mixture guarantees its sufficient level in the blood of healthy calves.
  • (17) The guarantee he gives of success is, again, based on his military record, citing what has become his catchphrase : “Mission failure is not an option.” 7.
  • (18) This regulation not only guarantees the suppression of overproduction of RNA polymerase subunits but also throws light on the problem of how the syntheses of RNA polymerase and ribosome respond similarly to the shift of nutrients and temperature, but differently to the starvation for amino acids.
  • (19) I've been told that I must not give guarantees, but I can give you something."
  • (20) I gave her my personal opinion, which was that there would be no problem for her, but I was not able to give her the guarantee that I think she was entitled to deserve.” The peer reminded the House of Lords about the shock in Britain when Idi Amin expelled the Asians from Uganda.

Promise


Definition:

  • (a.) In general, a declaration, written or verbal, made by one person to another, which binds the person who makes it to do, or to forbear to do, a specified act; a declaration which gives to the person to whom it is made a right to expect or to claim the performance or forbearance of a specified act.
  • (a.) An engagement by one person to another, either in words or in writing, but properly not under seal, for the performance or nonperformance of some particular thing. The word promise is used to denote the mere engagement of a person, without regard to the consideration for it, or the corresponding duty of the party to whom it is made.
  • (a.) That which causes hope, expectation, or assurance; especially, that which affords expectation of future distinction; as, a youth of great promise.
  • (a.) Bestowal, fulfillment, or grant of what is promised.
  • (v. t.) To engage to do, give, make, or to refrain from doing, giving, or making, or the like; to covenant; to engage; as, to promise a visit; to promise a cessation of hostilities; to promise the payment of money.
  • (v. t.) To afford reason to expect; to cause hope or assurance of; as, the clouds promise rain.
  • (v. t.) To make declaration of or give assurance of, as some benefit to be conferred; to pledge or engage to bestow; as, the proprietors promised large tracts of land; the city promised a reward.
  • (v. i.) To give assurance by a promise, or binding declaration.
  • (v. i.) To afford hopes or expectation; to give ground to expect good; rarely, to give reason to expect evil.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Yet the Tory promise of fiscal rectitude prevailed in England Alexander had been in charge of Labour’s election strategy, but he could not strategise a victory over a 20-year-old Scottish nationalist who has not yet taken her finals.
  • (2) The HTCA is promising as a potential tool for studying the biology of tumors.
  • (3) David Cameron last night hit out at his fellow world leaders after the G8 dropped the promise to meet the historic aid commitments made at Gleneagles in 2005 from this year's summit communique.
  • (4) The success in these two infertile patients who had already undergone lengthy psychotherapy is promising.
  • (5) Measuring this value therefore is a very promising procedure.
  • (6) The Coalition promises to add more misery to their lives.
  • (7) Meanwhile Ed Miliband, the Labour leader, waiting anxiously for news of the scale of the Labour advance in his first nationwide electoral test, will urge the electorate not to be duped by the promise of a coalition mark 2, predicting sham concessions by the Conservatives .
  • (8) John Lewis’s marketing, advertising and reputation are all built on their promises of good customer services, and it is a large part of what still drives people to their stores despite cheaper online outlets.
  • (9) On the basis of reports in the literature and of our own clinical experience it appears that melanocyte inhibiting factor (MIF) is a very promising therapeutic agent in the management of Parkinson's disease.
  • (10) Since the employment of microwave energy for defrosting biological tissues and for microwave-aided diagnosis in cryosurgery is very promising, the problem of ensuring the match between the contact antennas (applicators) and the frozen biological object has become a pressing one.
  • (11) The 20-25 year-old cohort was found to yield the most promising results; however, a statistical difference was not found to exist using the volume or area.
  • (12) The arrest of the Washington Post’s Tehran correspondent Jason Rezaian and his journalist wife, Yeganeh Salehi, as well as a photographer and her partner, is a brutal reminder of the distance between President Hassan Rouhani’s reforming promises and his willingness to act.
  • (13) The use of a new ultraviolet laser combined with a holographic grating spectrograph promises to increase the number of fluorescing species that can be detected simultaneously.
  • (14) So is the mock courtroom promising “justice and fairness”.
  • (15) But that promise was beginning to startle the markets, which admire Monti’s appetite for austerity and fear the free spending and anti-European views of some Italian politicians.
  • (16) Healthbars such as Nakd fit this category and promise to deliver one of your five a day, based on the quantity of freeze-dried date paste used.
  • (17) The most promising method was chemoradiotherapy using multifractionation of a daily dose of irradiation, the 4-year survival rate of 20% being achieved.
  • (18) Trials of these therapeutic schemes promise a higher efficacy of the therapeutic measures for gastroesophageal reflux.
  • (19) The glory lay in the defiance, although the outcome of the tie scarcely looks promising for Arsenal when the return at Camp Nou next Tuesday is borne in mind.
  • (20) One of the big sticking points is cash – with rich countries so far failing to live up to promise to mobilise $100bn a year by 2020 for climate finance .