Plain text that fills in the meaning of something with no visible label, like an icon button. Give it role="tooltip" and connect it to the trigger with aria-describedby. It must disappear as soon as the pointer leaves or focus moves away.
Most often confused with a popover. A tooltip holds only text, nothing inside it is clickable, and it opens on hover/focus. A popover can hold interactive content — buttons, links, a form — usually opens on click, and needs an outside click to close. The moment you want a "Learn more" button inside a tooltip, it's already a popover.
Relying on hover alone means keyboard and touch users never see it. The trigger must be a focusable element, and the same tooltip should appear on focus too.