A barrister is a type of lawyer in common law jurisdictions. Barristers mostly specialise in courtroom advocacy and litigation. Their tasks include taking cases in superior courts and tribunals, drafting legal pleadings, researching the law and giving expert legal opinions.

Barristers are distinguished from both solicitors and chartered legal executives, who have more direct access to clients, and may do transactional legal work. It is mainly barristers who are appointed as judges, and they are rarely hired by clients directly. In some legal systems, including those of Scotland, South Africa, Scandinavia, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, and the British Crown dependencies of Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man, the word barrister is also regarded as an honorific title.

In a few jurisdictions, barristers are usually forbidden from "conducting" litigation, and can only act on the instructions of a solicitor, and increasingly – chartered legal executives, who perform tasks such as corresponding with parties and the court, and drafting court documents. In England and Wales, barristers may seek authorisation from the Bar Standards Board to conduct litigation. This allows a barrister to practise in a "dual capacity", fulfilling the role of both barrister and solicitor.

In some common law jurisdictions, such as New Zealand, Canada and some Australian states and territories, lawyers are entitled to practise both as barristers and solicitors, but it remains a separate system of qualification to practise exclusively as a barrister. In others, such as the United States, the barrister, solicitor and chartered legal executive distinction does not exist at all.