In this video, we're going to do a recap of prokaryotic versus eukaryotic cells. And so notice down below we have this chart, and the chart is broken up into 3 different sections. We've got the left section over here, which is all about prokaryotic cells, then we have the right section over here in green, which is all about eukaryotic cells, and then in the middle here, we have features of both prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells. And so what you'll notice through the numbering over here and over there is that prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells really have 8 key differences. And so we're going to go through the differences first and then we'll wrap up talking about the similarities.
So the first and major key difference between prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells is that prokaryotic cells, once again, have no nucleus, whereas eukaryotic cells do have a nucleus. Now, also their size is really different; so prokaryotic cells tend to be much smaller, only somewhere between 1 10− micrometers, whereas eukaryotic cells, on the other hand, are much, much larger, and they can be between 10 to 100 micrometers on average, and so that's significantly larger. This means that prokaryotic cells, because they're smaller, are going to be less complex, whereas eukaryotic cells, which are larger, are going to be more complex. Prokaryotic cells are only going to be unicellular, made up of only one single cell. Whereas, eukaryotic cells on the other hand, can either be unicellular or they can be multicellular as well.
All multicellular organisms are going to be eukaryotic. Now, in terms of the DNA, prokaryotic cells have circular DNA in shape, whereas eukaryotic cells, on the other hand, have DNA that is linear in its shape. Prokaryotic cells have absolutely no membrane-bound organelles, whereas eukaryotic cells do have membrane-bound organelles. Now, in terms of the type of cell division, prokaryotic cells divide by a process called binary fission, which is much simpler than the process that eukaryotic cells divide by, and that is going to be mitosis and cytokinesis. And so, we'll talk more about mitosis and cytokinesis later in our course in a different video.
And then last but not least, prokaryotic cells have very small ribosomes that we call 70 S ribosomes, where the 70 here is going to imply the size, indicating that they're smaller. Whereas eukaryotic cells have larger 80 S ribosomes. So, the 80 here is larger than 70, and that's why eukaryotic cells have larger ribosomes. Now those are the 8 key differences between prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells, but once again they do have some similarities that we have here in the middle. And so, both prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells are going to have a cell membrane.
All cells have a cell membrane, and we'll get to talk more about the cell membrane in a different part of our course. Now, also, both prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells contain the major biomolecules that we talked about in some of our previous lesson videos, including carbohydrates, proteins, nucleic acids, and lipids. So both prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells take advantage of these major biomolecules here. And so this here really concludes our recap of prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells, and we'll be able to apply the concepts that we've learned here as we move forward through our course. So I'll see you all in our next video.