What's the difference between
and
Enter two words to compare and contrast their definitions, origins, and synonyms to better understand how those words are related.

Essential vs Primordial - What's the difference?

essential | primordial |

As adjectives the difference between essential and primordial

is that essential is necessary while primordial is first, earliest or original.

As nouns the difference between essential and primordial

is that essential is a necessary ingredient while primordial is a first principle or element.

essential

English

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • Necessary.
  • Very important; of high importance.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-05-17
    • , author=George Monbiot, authorlink=George Monbiot , title=Money just makes the rich suffer , volume=188, issue=23, page=19 , magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) citation , passage=In order to grant the rich these pleasures, the social contract is reconfigured. The welfare state is dismantled. Essential public services are cut so that the rich may pay less tax. […]}}
  • Being in the basic form; showing its essence.
    • Don’t mind him being grumpy. That’s the essential Fred.
  • Really existing; existent.
  • * Webster (1623)
    • Is it true, that thou art but a name, / And no essential thing?
  • Such that each complementary region is irreducible, the boundary of each complementary region is incompressible by disks and monogons in the complementary region, and no leaf is a sphere or a torus bounding a solid torus in the manifold.
  • (medicine) Idiopathic.

    • Synonyms

    * indispensable, crucial, substantive * See also

    Antonyms

    * inessential, unessential, accidental, nonessential, unneeded, adscititious, unimportant, accessorial, unnecessary, incidental

    Derived terms

    * essential amino acid * essential fatty acid * essential listening * essential nutrient * essential oil * essentially * essentialness * quintessential

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A necessary ingredient.
  • A fundamental ingredient.

    • Related terms

    * essence ----

    primordial

    English

    Adjective

    (-)
  • first, earliest or original
  • * Sir W. Hamilton
    • the primordial facts of our intelligent nature
  • (biology) characteristic of the earliest stage of the development of an organism, or relating to a primordium
    • a primordial''' leaf; a '''primordial cell
  • primeval

    • Derived terms

    * primordial black hole * primordial cell * primordial element * primordial fluctuations * primordial soup

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A first principle or element.