Local variable

A local variable (also called automatic storage, etc) in a programming language is one that only has storage allocated for it when the procedure or block in which the variable is defined is entered, during the execution of the program. Once that particular invocation of the procedure or block is exited, the values of all the automatic variables in it disappear.

Automatic variables are usually implemented with a stack. Also, they usually have a scope which is restricted to the procedure or block.