Offshoring is when a company has the work done in another country, usually to pay less for labour or running costs. The work still belongs to that company; only the place changes. A London bank may have its phones answered in the Philippines. A clothes brand may have the sewing done in Vietnam. That is offshoring. People constantly mix it with outsourcing. Outsourcing only means “we pay another firm to do it.” That firm might be next door. Offshoring is specifically about crossing a border. You can outsource without leaving the country, and you can offshore with your own staff abroad — though actually firms often do both at once, which is why the words get tangled. The term boomed in 1990s–2000s business talk, when factories, IT, and call centres poured out of richer countries. In a boardroom it sounds neat and technical. If your job is the one that left, it sounds like a threat. Companies later coined reshoring and nearshoring for pulling work home, or sending it to a closer country instead. You will also meet offshore as a verb: they offshored the IT department.

離岸外包、海外委外。台灣講整廠搬走也常說「產業外移」，但那較偏工廠外移，不一定是客服、IT 這類工作外送。