What is civil law compared to common law?

Answer 1

In a civil law system, laws are all codified, meaning everything that is a law is made by legislators through statutes, and is constantly updated. Civil law systems are most commonly found in Europe outside the UK, and South America.

In a common law system, law is made through judicial decisions by judges. Judges decide and develop the law through individual case decisions and those decisions are not codified in statutes, although legislators may additionally make laws through statutes. The UK and most of the US are common law systems.