Difference between Mandarin and Tangerine

Mandarin and Tangerine are citrus fruits. Both are orange in colour and taste the same and look alike, so people often confuse these fruits with each other. Despite sharing some feature, they are different from each other. Let us see how they differ from each other!

Mandarin:

Mandarin orange, which is also known as a mandarin, is a citrus fruit that belongs to the citrus family, Rutaceae. It is orange in colour and looks like a small orange. It is oblate in shape and its skin is smoother and thinner than that of tangerine, so it can be peeled off easily and the inner segments are also easy to separate.

Mandarin is sweeter in taste than its citrus cousins and often sold in cans or jars and mostly used in fruit salads, lettuce salads and cakes. It is commonly canned and preserved in light sugary syrup and is good for snack, lunchboxes and salads. It is also good for health as it is rich in nutrients. One mandarin contains 53 calories, 166 mg of Potassium and 27 mg of Vitamin C. They are also rich in Vitamin A, folic acid and flavonoids.

Tangerines:

Tangerine is a citrus fruit that belongs to the citrus family, Rutaceae. Tangerines are a subgroup of mandarins. Botanically, mandarins refer to three classifications of oranges: Satsumas, Tangerines and Miscellaneous hybrids. So tangerines are classified as a type of mandarin orange and thus technically tangerines are mandarin oranges, i.e. a tangerine can be a mandarin orange, but not all mandarin oranges are tangerines.

Tangerines have slightly softer skins than oranges and also less tart in taste than oranges. They have seeds and can be easily peeled. They are reddish-orange in colour and are sweeter than that of oranges. They are round and more spherical in shape with a thick and pebbly skin so they can be exported to other countries as they are tougher when it comes to shipping and survival in the low temperatures.

Based on the above information, some of the key differences mandarin and tangerine are as follows: