Neurotransmitters vs. Hormones: Key Differences and Functions

3.10.2025 0 comments

Author: Trisha Houghton, CNS, ASIST

Your body has two special types of chemical messengers that transmit signals to elicit specific responses in your body.

These are called neurotransmitters and hormones.

While these two are different cell types, they have a surprising number of similarities between them—so many people can sometimes confuse their function.

In this post, we’ll take a deep dive into the subject and examine the crucial differences between neurotransmitters vs hormones.

We’ll look closely at what each type of cell is, how they affect the body, and examples of both. We’ll also look at the specific reactions each elicits in the body so you understand the critical differences that set them apart.

What are Neurotransmitters? An Overview

Neurotransmitters are the chemical messengers that transmit signals from cell to cell.

Neurotransmitters relay the signals from neurons, across synapses (microscopic spaces), and deliver them to the target cells, there to elicit some specific reaction.

The majority of neurons produce just one type of neurotransmitter. However, cells can be affected by multiple neurotransmitters at the same time, which can trigger a variety of chemical reactions.

How Neurotransmitters Work: Mechanisms and Pathways

To understand neurotransmitters, you need to understand how nerve cells work.

Nerve cells are made up of three different parts:

• The cell body, which produces the neurotransmitter and maintains cellular function.
• The axon, which carries electrical signals through the nerve cell to the axon terminal.
• The axon terminal, which transforms the electrical signals to chemical signals, and sends the message relayed by the neurotransmitter on to the next cells.

Neurotransmitters are stored in the axon terminal, inside synaptic vesicles, thin-walled sacs that serve as housing for thousands of neurotransmitter molecules at the same time.

When a signal or message is relayed via a nerve cell, the electrical charge triggers the fusing of the vesicles with the nerve cell membrane. The nerve cell releases those neurotransmitters into the synaptic junction, the fluid-filled space between your body’s cells.

The synaptic junction conveys the neurotransmitter to the next cell, where it fits with a specific receptor that triggers some change or activity in the cell.

This chain of events is the reason that your body can function. Everything from muscle contraction to hormone release is triggered by neurotransmitters.

Types of Neurotransmitters and Their Roles

There have been more than a hundred different types of neurotransmitters discovered by researchers, and it’s believed more have yet to be identified.

They can be grouped into a few categories:

• Amino acids neurotransmitters. These play a role in cognition, brain activity, sleep, depression, pain transmission, and pain.
• Monoamines neurotransmitters. These regulate your attention, consciousness, emotion, and cognition. They also play a role in libido, sexuality, appetite, feeding behavior, and your body’s reward system.
• Peptide neurotransmitters. These are formed of amino acid chains and play a role in reducing your body’s perception of pain.

One neurotransmitter that’s in a category all its own is acetylcholine. It’s released by the majority of your autonomic nervous system neurons and is crucial for controlling your gut motility, heart rate, and blood pressure. It’s also involved in memory, sexual desire, muscle contractions, learning, and sleep.

Examples of Key Neurotransmitters and Their Functions

Here are a few examples of some very important neurotransmitters and a description of their role in your body’s function:

• Glutamate, an amino acid neurotransmitter, is the most abundant of the excitatory neurotransmitters in the human brain. Its function includes regulating cognitive functions, including memory, learning, and thinking. A lack of glutamate has been linked to a higher risk of neurodegenerative conditions like Parkinson’s disease, seizures, and Alzheimer’s.
• GABA, also an amino acid neurotransmitter, is the most common of the inhibitory neurotransmitters in the human brain. It controls brain activity and plays a role in depression, anxiety, concentration, irritability, sleep, and seizures.
• Serotonin, a monoamine neurotransmitter, regulates your mood, affects your sleep patterns, and controls your perception of pain, anxiety, appetite, and sexual desire. An imbalance of serotonin can lead to depression, anxiety disorders, fibromyalgia, and seasonal affective disorder.
• Dopamine, also a monoamine neurotransmitter, triggers your feelings of pleasure and arousal. It’s critical for learning, motivation, memory, concentration, focus, and mood. Dysfunctions of the dopamine system are associated with conditions like ADHD, restless legs syndrome (RLS), Parkinson’s disease, schizophrenia, and bipolar disorder.
• Epinephrine (also called adrenaline), another monoamine neurotransmitter, regulates your body’s response to danger, stress, or fear. It’s your “fight or flight” response that is both a hormone and a neurotransmitter that stimulates a response in your body: elevated blood pressure, higher blood sugar levels, increased breathing and heart rate, and heightened attention. All of this is intended to help you react to or act based on messages sent by your body as a result of stressors or warning signals.
• Endorphins,a peptide neurotransmitter, is your body’s natural pain regulator and reliever. The release of endorphins reduces our perception of pain and elevates “feel good” sensations. Low endorphin levels have been linked to fibromyalgia and certain forms of headaches.

Neurotransmitters shape how we think, feel, and react to the world around us. When they’re in balance, we stay focused, regulate emotions, and respond to stress effectively. But when something goes off track, it can lead to challenges like anxiety, memory issues, or chronic pain.

Scientists are learning more every day, opening doors to better treatments and a deeper understanding of how our brains keep us going.

Speed and Specificity of Neurotransmitter Actions

Neurotransmitters act nearly instantly in the body. Typically, the response time is within milliseconds. That means whatever signal they send will have a near-instant and visible effect in the body.

However, neurotransmitters will only affect cells that have the specific receptors necessary to “read” them. Neurotransmitters are like a key that will only elicit a reaction when the adjacent neurons have a specific lock (in the form of cellular receptors keyed to that neurotransmitter).

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What are Hormones? An Introduction

Unlike neurotransmitters, hormones are chemical messengers that help regulate physiological processes over time, throughout the body’s tissues and organs.

Hormones travel through your bloodstream to send signals that regulate your body’s function.

However, as you’ll soon see, there are a few significant differences in the way they control the body that set them apart from neurotransmitters.

How Hormones Work: The Endocrine System and Signal Transmission

The endocrine system is a system of glands, organs, and tissues that produce and release hormones.

It’s made up of:

• The hypothalamus and the pineal gland in the brain;
• The pituitary gland just below the brain;
• The thyroid and parathyroid glands in the front of the neck;
• The thymus in the upper chest;
• The adrenal glands on top of the kidneys;
• The pancreas in the back of the abdomen;
• The ovaries and testes.

These glands produce hormones that act as chemical messengers to the body.

However, other body parts that aren’t considered part of the endocrine system also produce hormones, including the liver, kidneys, placenta, adipose tissue, and gastrointestinal tract.

Hormones travel through your blood to act on specific parts of the body. Like neurotransmitters, hormones will only work if the cell they’re intended to affect have the specific endocrine receptors (the lock and key analogy holds true here, too).

Hormones are utilized for two forms of communication:

• Communication between endocrine glands. A gland releases a hormone, which tells another gland to alter or adjust the levels of a hormone or hormones it’s releasing. A good example of this is how the pituitary gland uses thyroid-stimulating hormone to tell the thyroid gland to release more thyroid hormones.
• Communication between an endocrine gland and target organ. An endocrine gland releases a hormone that triggers a reaction in a specific organ. A good example of this is how your pancreas releases insulin to tell your liver and muscles to process or uptake blood sugar (glucose).

Hormones quietly regulate nearly every function in the body, from metabolism to mood. They work behind the scenes and ensure that organs communicate and adapt to changing needs. When hormone levels shift, they can impact energy, growth, and overall health. Understanding how they interact helps us recognize imbalances and explore ways to restore harmony in the body.

Types of Hormones and Their Functions

There are around 50 different known hormones acting within the human body, but it’s believed there are more yet to be discovered.

They can be broken down into three main types:

• Peptide hormones, made up of short chains of amino acids, are soluble in blood and play a role in metabolism, regulating blood glucose levels, and in nursing and childbirth.
• Amino acid hormones, also called amino hormones, are made up of amino acids and only some are soluble in blood. These include thyroid hormones and dopamine, as well as epinephrine.
• Steroid hormones, made of cholesterol, are not blood soluble. They include testosterone and estrogen, the sex hormones.

Each hormone type interacts differently with cells and influences processes like metabolism, stress response, and reproduction.

Examples of Major Hormones and Their Impact on the Body

There are a few key hormones that play a role in regulating your bodily functions and triggering the cellular reactions necessary to maintain homeostasis.

They are:

• Growth hormone, secreted by the pituitary gland, affects the development and growth in the human body, along with fat distribution and the production of protein.
• Luteinizing hormone (LH) and follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), both produced by the pituitary gland, regulate the production of sex hormones (testosterone for men, estrogen for women), as well as the production of sperm in men and eggs in women.
• Insulin, produced in your pancreas, lowers the level of glucose in your bloodstream and stimulates the metabolism of fats, proteins, and glucose.
• Melatonin, released by your pineal gland, regulates your sleep-wake cycle.
• Cortisol, the stress hormone, which regulates your immune function, blood sugar, blood pressure, and inflammatory response when triggered by stress. It also plays a role in your sleep-wake cycle and metabolism.

These hormones help the body adapt to changing needs, from growth and energy use to stress and reproduction. When their levels shift, they can impact sleep, metabolism, and overall health in significant ways.

Duration and Systemic Impact of Hormonal Actions

Hormonal effects vary in speed. In fact, while some take minutes or hours to trigger an effect, others will require daysfor their signals to be recognized and the appropriate response to take place in the body.

However, they are able to affect any part of the body where the cells have the proper endocrine receptors. Their impact is very widespread and can last for much longer.

Neurotransmitters That Are Also Hormones

It’s important to note that a few neurotransmitters also act as hormones in the body. While they are released as neurotransmitters, they can also have a hormone-like effect.

For example:

• Dopamine, one of the most crucial neurotransmitters in the brain, can function as a hormone by impacting movement, affecting the body’s reward pathways, and motivation.
• Epinephrine (also called adrenaline) and norepinephrine (also called noradrenaline), both of which are triggered as a stress response, act as both neurotransmitters and hormones in the body. They will increase your heart rate, blood pressure, oxygen uptake, and glucose levels.
• Serotonin, the neurotransmitter that transmits signals between your central nervous system cells, also sends hormone-like effects in the gut where it impacts digestive functions and communicates with the nervous system. In this way, it acts as both a neurotransmitter and hormone.

The dual role of these neurotransmitters highlights the deep connection between the endocrine and nervous systems. Their ability to act as both messengers in the brain and regulators in the body shows how tightly linked our mental and physical health are.

Differences and Similarities Between Neurotransmitters and Hormones

Understanding the differences between neurotransmitters and hormones will help you realize that though their body functions are similar, the way they act sets them apart.

Reaction Speed

Hormones take minutes, hours, or even days to trigger an effect in the body.

Neurotransmitters have an effect within milliseconds.

Systems of Origin

Hormones are produced by the endocrine system.

Neurotransmitters are produced by the nervous system.

Origin Point and Dispersal Method

Hormones are produced in endocrine glands (and other organs/tissues, as you saw above) and are released into the bloodstream to be dispersed through the body.

Neurotransmitters are released into the synapse by the presynaptic terminal. There, they travel across the synaptic cleft to affect the next cell or cell cluster.

Range of Affect

Hormones can affect distant cells in any part of the body and only those that have the target endocrine receptor will respond.

Neurotransmitters can only affect the next cell or next cell cluster over.

Main Function

Hormones regulate growth, development, reproduction, mood, sleep, and metabolism.

Neurotransmitters are utilized for regulating communication between neurons, primarily affecting cognition, learning, memory, motor function, and other autonomic functions. However, some can also play a role in sleep and mood.

Wrapping Up

It’s fascinating to learn how the body regulates its function through these similar yet so crucially different chemical messengers!

While neurotransmitters keep your nervous system functioning and transport signals from one nerve cell to the next, hormones transport signals from your endocrine system to your entire body.

Both hormones and neurotransmitters play similar critical roles in keeping your body running, and their disparate functions ensure a smoother, more efficient regulation of homeostasis.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Can something be a hormone and a neurotransmitter?

Yes, as you saw above, multiple neurotransmitters—including dopamine, serotonin, epinephrine, and norepinephrine—can also function as hormones. Their impact can be both immediate and localized (neurotransmitter) and widespread and longer-lasting (hormone).

What is the difference between a hormone and a neuron?

A hormone is a chemical messenger released by your endocrine glands to travel through the bloodstream to regulate physiological functions in your body. Neurons are nerve cells that send electrical and chemical signals (in the form of neurotransmitters) through the central and peripheral nervous systems. They are the basic building blocks of your entire nervous system, including the brain and spinal cord as well as the nerves.

Do hormones or neurotransmitters last longer?

Hormones last significantly longer than neurotransmitters. The effects of neurotransmitters are instantaneous and as a result, they are cleared from the synapse quickly. Hormones exert their effects over wider areas for longer periods, and take longer to be broken down and cleared out of the bloodstream.

Resources

Difference Between Hormines and Neurotransmitters

What Defines a Neurotransmitter?

Feel-good hormones: How they affect your mind, mood, and body

Neurotransmitters

Sex hormones affect neurotransmitters and shape the adult female brain during hormonal transition periods

Hormones

18.1 Types of Hormones

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