Iron vs Titanium
Both are transition metals, so they share the same broad chemistry.
The differences in plain English
- They share period 4, the same row, so their outer electrons are in the same shell but they differ in how many there are: Iron has 2, Titanium has 2.
- Both are solids at room temperature.
- Iron is denser, about 75 per cent more than Titanium (7.874 against 4.506 g/cm³).
- Titanium melts at 1668 °C, Iron at 1538 °C.
- An atom of Iron is about 17 per cent heavier than an atom of Titanium (55.85 u against 47.87 u).
- Iron pulls electrons more strongly in a bond (electronegativity 1.83 against 1.54).
Side by side
| Iron | Titanium | |
|---|---|---|
| Atomic number | 26 | 22 |
| Symbol | Fe | Ti |
| Family | Transition metal | Transition metal |
| Group / period | 8 / 4 | 4 / 4 |
| State at room temperature | Solid | Solid |
| Atomic mass | 55.845 u | 47.867 u |
| Density | 7.874 g/cm³ | 4.506 g/cm³ |
| Melting point | 1538 °C | 1668 °C |
| Boiling point | 2861 °C | 3287 °C |
| Electronegativity | 1.83 | 1.54 |
| First ionisation energy | 762.5 kJ/mol | 658.8 kJ/mol |
| Electron configuration | [Ar] 3d6 4s2 | [Ar] 3d2 4s2 |
| Discovered by | 5000 BC | William Gregor |
Iron
Iron makes up most of the Earth's core, gives the planet its magnetic field, colours the surface of Mars and carries oxygen around your body. It is the metal humans have used most for three thousand years, and each year well over a billion tonnes of steel are made, almost all of it iron. It is cheap, strong, magnetic, and it rusts.
- The Earth's magnetic field is generated by liquid iron churning in the outer core, some 3000 kilometres beneath your feet.
- Tutankhamun's dagger, found in his tomb, was made from meteoritic iron centuries before the Iron Age began in Egypt.
Titanium
Titanium is the metal of hip replacements, jet engines, racing bikes and the white in almost every tin of paint. It combines strength with lightness and shrugs off seawater and body fluids, thanks to a thin, tough oxide skin that forms the instant it meets air.
- Klaproth named titanium after the Titans of Greek myth; he had named uranium after the planet Uranus a few years earlier.
- The SR-71 Blackbird spy plane was built largely from titanium because aluminium would have softened at the temperatures reached in flight.
Colour the bubbles by density or melting point and the difference jumps out.
More comparisons
Data from Periodic-Table-JSON (CC BY-SA); temperatures rounded to the nearest degree. Written by Anthony.