Christmas vs. Thanksgiving Cactus (Pics)

I have to admit that I did not always know the difference between a Christmas Cactus and a Thanksgiving Cactus. To be honest, I never even questioned whether there was a difference. But now that I am more into plants than I used to be, I Google everything, and realized there was a difference. It didn't take me long to recognize the difference, but that was because I happened to score a "true Christmas Cactus" from an older lady this past spring. So I had both types side by side to compare. I guess there is a lot of confusion as to which particular hybrid one might have, and I think it would be best to do a side by side comparison. There are other links and pages that go into much more detail than I will, one of the best is this one.

I can not compare the flowers as I have not seen my "true Christmas Cactus" in flower yet. Again, for a comparison of the flowers, the link above explains it pretty well.

My whole purpose was to put both of these different hybrids side by side for others to see for themselves the differences. I hope this helps someone someday : )

The Christmas cactus is the plant on the left while the thanksgiving cactus is the one on the right. One of the biggest differences is that the Thanksgiving cactus has more jagged segments. Another difference is that the Christmas cactus is more of a cascading / hanging plant, whereas the Thanksgiving cactus grows more upright (I guess when they get bigger, they might tend to slope over)

Here is a pic of the two side by side more close up. Again the Christmas cactus is on the left, while the Thanksgiving cactus is on the right.

Now I had to do this to really compare the two, I think this would help a lot of people in recognizing the difference. Now of course, I messed this pic up, not even thinking. So the Thanksgiving cactus is on the left in this pic, it is the one with the pointy segments. The Christmas cactus is on the right this time, notice how it is much more rounded. Another difference I personally noticed, is that the Christmas cactus segments (say that five times fast....lol) are slightly smaller than it's counterpart, even though it does not show much in this pic.