What is the difference between yams and sweet potatoes?

I think they are very similar. I prefer Yams, but won’t turn down a Sweet Tater.

Yams are sweeter, can grow up to seven feet long (good for Thanksgiving dinner, I guess), and aren’t related at all to the sweet potato.

I would go over to wikipedia to look it up, but I figure you can do that. Probably they are the same.

Same vegetable, just called a different name, depending on where you live.

Sweet potatoes and yams are NOT the same vegetable. According to my fresh produce guide, “true yams are an entirely different kind of tuber,” although in the South, sweet potatoes are called yams, but that doesn’t mean that they ARE yams…they’re completely different. My book doesn’t say which one is more nutritious, but it does say that yams are an excellent source of potassium, and they have more fiber than sweet potatoes.

And sweet potatoes are better at normalizing blood sugar. Yams don’t do that.

They are not the same vegetable, but in the US the name is ‘yam’ is often applied to a sweet potato.

True ‘yams’ are bigger and almost white. Indiginous to Africa I believe. These are rarely (never) seen in the US.

The primary difference is intelligent marketing.

Years ago, some marketing genius in the South wanted to make their product (sweet potatoes) stand out from all the rest.

So, they began calling theirs yams. Eventually it morphed into a generic term for sweet potatoes HERE in the US.

In other parts of the world, a yam is a starchy tuber with pale flesh and significantly larger and much longer and not sweet.