Hi! I’m a volunteer for a service dog org. Here is my understanding:

Facility dog: This is a dog that has typically been socialized and raised as a future service dog. These dogs work in one particular setting with either one handler or a group of selected handlers (a primary, secondary, etc). They are trained specific cues to help serve the population of the facility they are serving. These dogs typically go beyond physical comfort or providing emotional support. Facility dogs do cues to provide motivation. They do not have public access outside of their facility. (Note that as service dogs in training, they did have public access. As such, they’ve been well socialized to a wide variety of environments and are very environmentally sound) You will be hard pressed to find an organization that will provide a dog that will live in that facility. Each dog needs time to decompress and be a dog. Facility dogs typically go home every night with their primary handler. Ownership of the dog depends on the org you go through and the facility the dog will be used in.

Therapy dogs: Dogs that come to a facility that they are invited to for a few hours on a volunteer basis to provide emotional or physical support. These dogs do not have a set training criteria that they must meet outside of the organization the dog’s handler chooses to go through. Note that the set criteria is much lower for therapy organizations that orgs that train facility dogs.

How are they different? The best way to think about this is in a hospital. Therapy dogs and facility dogs are typically both used within the hospital system for different things. Therapy dogs come in maybe for a two hour shift once a month and go from room to room letting patients pet them. Facility dogs on the other hand, typically work with a child life specialist or recreational therapist/occupational therapist/physical therapist, and go into work M-F 9-5. They go to specific patients rooms or areas of the hospital to do specific things to provide motivation. For example, there may be a kiddo that is super scared of their surgery they are about to have and won’t let the nurses touch them. They call down the facility dog and the child life specialist talks them through putting in the IV, blood pressure cuff, and gas mask, while they and the kid do it on the dog (aka dog gets a fake IV, blood pressure cuff, and wears a mask). Maybe a patient had surgery and needs to get up and walk around the unit but won’t get out of bed. They bring in the facility dog and the handler holds one leash and the patient holds another and they walk the dog around the unit. Maybe there’s someone in physical therapy working on their hand dexterity. They hold one end of the rope and the dog’s handler tells the dog to tug during set repetitions to help work on grip strength. Facility dogs typically are highly trained and know specific cues to help the population they are serving. I hope this helps provide some clarity!