Glove compartment

Glove compartment of a Ford Fusion with an owner's manual visible
Open glove compartment of a right-hand drive car assembled in Australia by Australian Motor Industries (AMI)

A glove compartment or glove box is a compartment built into the dashboard of an automobile, located over the front-seat passenger's footwell, and often used for miscellaneous storage. The name derives from the original purpose of the compartment, to store driving gloves. They were sometimes in a box on the floorboard near the driver, hence the phrase "glove box". In most vehicles, the glove compartment closes with a latch, with the option of being locked with a key (often desirable when using valet service, when parking with the convertible top down, or when the compartment contains a mechanism to open the trunk).