Life on Earth as well as its further development is linked to water. Humans have always searched for sources of drinking water and developed their socio-cultural communities around them. Underground water belongs to one of the purest forms of water in nature, and wells have been used for capturing it since prehistoric times. This paper presents an overview of wells through World and European history, and it also describes their development in costruction and use, as well as the role and significance of the well in daily life of man. We will get to know the basic parts of the well and their roles. There are several divisions of wells: according to construction, according to the type of flow and with regard to the position in relation to the aquifer. A special emphasis will be placed on the similarities and differences of wells of various construction types, but we will also talk about the artesian well, the main representative of the group of wells under pressure. The movement of underground water towards the wells is almost always non-stationary due to the variability of hydrological conditions and the abundance of the wells, but there is also a stationary flow of water. The paper will present extracts and descriptions of characteristic laws and equations that describe the stationary and non-stationary movement of water towards the well. Finally, with a few examples, we will try to create an idea of the main characteristics and use of wells in Croatia.