Small appliance refers to a class of home appliance

Home appliance

Home appliances are electrical/mechanical machines which accomplish some household functions, such as cooking or cleaning. Home appliances can be classified into:*Major appliances, or White goods*Small appliances, or Brown goods...

s that are portable or semi-portable or which are used on tabletops, countertops, or other platforms in the United States of America (in the United Kingdom this class is called 'Brown Goods' due to their original use of wooden cases). Such items are contrasted with major appliance

Major appliance

A major appliance, or domestic appliance, is usually defined as a large machine which accomplishes some routine housekeeping task, which includes purposes such as cooking, or food preservation, whether in a household, institutional, commercial or industrial setting...

s, which are typically fixtures that cannot be easily moved. All appliances are intended to perform, enable, or assist in performing a job or changing a status, such as the humidity of a room.