Can you explain what the term 'Static' means in programming?

In programming, the keyword static indicates that a class member (variable, method, property) belongs to the class itself rather than to any specific instance of the class.

This means:

• Static members exist as a single instance for the entire class.
• They can be accessed without creating an object of the class.
• They are often used to store common data or utility methods.

Example in C#:

class Calculator
{
    public static int Add(int a, int b)
    {
        return a + b;
    }
}

// Calling a static method without creating an object
int result = Calculator.Add(5, 3); // result = 8

You can also declare static fields that are shared among all objects of the class. This is useful for storing global state or counters.