Difference between Prime and Composite Numbers
Following table lists five differences between a prime and composite number:
Prime vs Composite Numbers | |
---|---|
Prime Numbers | Composite Numbers |
All the natural numbers greater than 1 that have only two factors – one and the number itself are called prime numbers. | All natural numbers that can be expressed as a product of at least two smaller natural numbers are known as composite numbers. |
Prime numbers have exactly two factors – 1 and the number itself. | Composite numbers have at least 3 or more factors. |
All the prime numbers except 2 are odd numbers. | There is no such pattern for composite numbers. They can be odd and even both. |
Their prime factorization has only one prime factor i.e., the number itself. | Their prime factorization can have one or more prime factors. |
Examples: 2, 3, 5, 7, … | Examples: 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, … |
Prime and Composite Numbers
Prime and Composite Numbers are commonly used classifications of Natural Numbers based on divisibility and the number of Factors. A Prime Number has only two factors while Composite Numbers have more than two factors. This classification of Numbers makes the study of natural numbers more organized and convenient and is useful in a variety of situations like computer algorithms, biology, understanding of Number Theory, etc.
This article describes what are prime and composite numbers, the types of primes and composite numbers, and tests to check whether a given number is prime or not (primality tests). Finally, a few solved questions, and a few practice problems related to prime and composite numbers are presented.
Table of Content
- What are Prime and Composite Numbers?
- Types of Prime and Composite numbers
- Prime and Composite Numbers from 1 to 100
- Prime and Composite Numbers chart
- Difference between Prime and Composite Numbers
- Tests for Prime and Composite numbers
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