cannister vs container

cannister and container both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
cannister	Yes	No	No	No
container	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, container is a hypernym of cannister; that is, container is a word with a broader meaning than cannister:

cannister: metal container for storing dry foods such as tea or flour
container: any object that can be used to hold things (especially a large metal boxlike object of standardized dimensions that can be loaded from one form of transport to another)

cannister (noun)	container (noun)
metal container for storing dry foods such as tea or flour	any object that can be used to hold things (especially a large metal boxlike object of standardized dimensions that can be loaded from one form of transport to another)