system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Difference between character progression and character development.

It would be great if you could provide some examples from well known fiction.
gpt
Character developement basically means that a character gets fleshed out, whereas character progression means that a character changes.

I'll give examples from Harry Potter, since it's a fairly well-known story. Dumbledore doesn't have much character progression, his character is pretty much the same at the end of the story as it started out. However, he has a good amount of character developement, as we get to know his world view and his motivations, for example. Harry himself on the other hand gets more character progression than character developement - the story is more about him coming of age than it is about exploring his character. Not that he's undeveloped of course, but it's less of a focus for him.

Essentially, characters progress, but they are developed.

Note though that character progression is often wrongly used interchangably with character developement.