Violence against women (VAW), also known as gender-based violence and sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV), is violent acts primarily or exclusively committed by men or boys against women or girls. Such violence is often considered a form of hate crime, committed against women or girls specifically because they are female, and can take many forms.

Violence is the use of physical force to cause harm to people, non-human animals, or property, such as pain, injury, death, damage, or destruction. Some definitions are somewhat broader, such as the World Health Organization's definition of violence as "the intentional use of physical force or power, threatened or actual, against oneself, another person, or against a group or community, which either results in or has a high likelihood of resulting in injury, death, psychological harm, maldevelopment, or deprivation."