What is the difference between working and short term memory?

What is the difference between working and short term memory?

Short-term memory is a memory mechanism which holds a limited amount information for a brief period of time (around 30 seconds). Working memory, however, works as a system for temporary storage and manipulation of information for more complex tasks like comprehension, reasoning and learning.

Both working memory and short term memory can only store a small number of elements for a brief period of time. The most prominent differences between working memory and STM are: working memory allows for manipulation of the elements (unlike short-term memory which does not) and working memory is built of a few components (visuospatial sketch pad, phonological loop, central executive) unlike short-term memory which consist only of one.

The STM can only hold an information for 15-30 seconds. However it cannot take any actions with the given information except putting it in LTM. The working memory can manipulate with this infromation, because it is built from many components. So while we talk or overthink something, we use WM.