It originated in Europe for automotive applications. The physical medium is not part of the standard, but is typically two-wire twisted pair. Low power devices can be powered directly from the bus. The bus is optimized for control, not data. The maximum packet length is 8 Bytes.
Some controllers directly implement buffering and message filtering, which makes the software easy.
Good error detection and correction, as well as, e.g. , built-in soft resets. It is a multi-drop bus. The physical layer is left open. CAN has a moderate learning curve. D'Addario asked about timing.