In Kotlin, everything is an object in the sense that we can call member functions and properties on any variable. Some of the types can have a special internal representation - for example, numbers, characters and booleans can be represented as primitive values at runtime - but to the user they look like ordinary classes.

var a: String = "initial"  // 1
println(a)
val b: Int = 1             // 2
val c = 3                  // 3

1. Declares a mutable variable and initializing it.
2. Declares an immutable variable and initializing it.
3. Declares an immutable variable and initializing it without specifying the type. The compiler infers the type Int.

var e: Int  // 1
println(e)  // 2

1. Declares a variable without initialization.
2. An attempt to use the variable causes a compiler error: Variable 'e' must be initialized.

You're free to choose when you initialize a variable, however, it must be initialized before the first read.

val d: Int  // 1

if (someCondition()) {
    d = 1   // 2
} else {
    d = 2   // 2
}

println(d) // 3

1. Declares a variable without initialization.
2. Initializes the variable with different values depending on some condition.
3. Reading the variable is possible because it's already been initialized.