Heart rate is a measure of how many times your heart contracts (or beats) in a minute. It’s an important indicator of your cardiovascular health and fitness level. Heart rate can change based on factors like physical activity, emotions, temperature, and even medication.

Pulse rate, on the other hand, is the number of times you can feel the expansion of your arteries due to the surge of blood being pumped by your heart. This expansion and contraction of the arteries is what creates the pulse. When you feel your pulse, you’re actually feeling the blood moving through your body in sync with your heartbeats. It’s most commonly measured at the radial artery in your wrist or the carotid artery in your neck.

The reason why pulse rate might be slightly slower than heart rate is because there’s a slight delay between your heart contracting and the blood reaching the arteries where you feel the pulse. This is due to the time it takes for the blood to travel from your heart to those arteries.

In most cases, when people talk about heart rate or pulse rate, they’re referring to very similar numbers. For instance, if someone says their heart rate is 70 beats per minute, their pulse rate is likely to be around the same number. But remember, these terms highlight different aspects of how your heart is working: one from the inside (heart rate) and one from the outside (pulse rate).