Flagship vs. Primary — What's the Difference?

A flagship is a vessel used by the commanding officer of a group of naval ships, characteristically a flag officer entitled by custom to fly a distinguishing flag. Used more loosely, it is the lead ship in a fleet of vessels, typically the first, largest, fastest, most heavily armed, or best known.

Of chief importance; principal

A ship that carries a fleet or squadron commander and bears the commander's flag.

Earliest in time or order

The chief one of a related group

Not derived from, caused by, or based on anything else; original

The ship occupied by the fleet's commander (usually an admiral); it denotes this by flying his flag.

Relating to or denoting education for children between the ages of about five and eleven

(nautical) The ship regarded as most important out of a group, e.g. a nation's navy or company's fleet.

Former term for Palaeozoic

The most important one out of a related group.

Relating to or denoting the input side of a transformer or other inductive device.

To act as a flagship for.

(of an organic compound) having its functional group located on a carbon atom which is bonded to no more than one other carbon atom

The vessel which carries the commanding officer of a fleet or squadron and flies his distinctive flag or pennant.

(in the US) a preliminary election to appoint delegates to a party conference or to select the candidates for a principal, especially presidential, election

The chief one of a related group;

A primary colour.

The ship that carries the commander of a fleet and flies his flag

The Palaeozoic era.

First or highest in rank or importance; principal.

Occurring first in time or sequence; earliest

Of or relating to primary schools.

Not derived from anything else; basic or original

Immediate; direct

(Geology) Characteristic of or existing in a rock at the time of its formation.

Of or relating to a primary color or colors.

Having a word root or other linguistic element as a basis that cannot be further analyzed or broken down. Used of the derivation of a word or word element.

Referring to present or future time. Used as a collective designation for various present and future verb tenses in Latin, Greek, and Sanskrit.

Of or relating to primary stress.

(Electronics) Of, relating to, or constituting an inducting current, circuit, or coil.

Of, relating to, or designating the main flight feathers projecting along the outer edge of a bird's wing.

Of or relating to agriculture, forestry, the industries that extract natural materials from the earth, or the products so obtained

Relating to, or having a carbon atom that is attached to only one other carbon atom in a molecule.

Relating to the replacement of only one of several atoms or groups in a compound, such as an amine in which one valence of the functional group is taken by a carbon atom.

(Botany) Of, relating to, or derived from a primary meristem.

One that is first in time, order, or sequence.

One that is first or best in degree, quality, or importance.

One that is fundamental, basic, or elemental.

A meeting of the registered voters of a political party for the purpose of nominating candidates and for choosing delegates to their party convention.

A preliminary election in which the registered voters of a political party nominate candidates for office.

A primary color.

A primary flight feather.

(Electronics) An inducting current, circuit, or coil.

A celestial body, especially a star, relative to other bodies in orbit around it.

The brighter of two stars that make up a binary star.

First or earliest in a group or series.

Main; principal; chief; placed ahead of others.

(geology) Earliest formed; fundamental.

(chemistry) Illustrating, possessing, or characterized by, some quality or property in the first degree; having undergone the first stage of substitution or replacement.

(medicine) Relating to the place where a disorder or disease started to occur.

(medicine) Relating to day-to-day care provided by health professionals such as nurses, general practitioners, dentists etc.

A primary election; a preliminary election to select a political candidate of a political party.

The first year of grade school.

A base or fundamental component; something that is irreducible.

The most massive component of a gravitationally bound system, such as a planet in relation to its satellites.

A primary school.

(ornithology) Any flight feather attached to the manus (hand) of a bird.

A primary colour.

(military) The first stage of a thermonuclear weapon, which sets off a fission explosion to help trigger a fusion reaction in the weapon's secondary stage.

(aviation) A radar return from an aircraft (or other object) produced solely by the reflection of the radar beam from the aircraft's skin, without additional information from the aircraft's transponder.

(medicine) Primary site of disease; original location or source of the disease.

(electronics) A directly driven inductive coil, as in a transformer or induction motor that is magnetically coupled to a secondary

To challenge (an incumbent sitting politician) for their political party's nomination to run for re-election, through running a challenger campaign in a primary election, especially one that is more ideologically extreme.

To take part in a primary election.

First in order of time or development or in intention; primitive; fundamental; original.

First in order, as being preparatory to something higher; as, primary assemblies; primary schools.

First in dignity or importance; chief; principal; as, primary planets; a matter of primary importance.

Earliest formed; fundamental.

Illustrating, possessing, or characterized by, some quality or property in the first degree; having undergone the first stage of substitution or replacement.

That which stands first in order, rank, or importance; a chief matter.

A primary meeting; a caucus.

One of the large feathers on the distal joint of a bird's wing. See Plumage, and Illust. of Bird.

A primary planet; the brighter component of a double star. See under Planet.

A preliminary election where delegates or nominees are chosen

One of the main flight feathers projecting along the outer edge of a bird's wing

Coil forming the part of an electrical circuit such that changing current in it induces a current in a neighboring circuit;

Of first rank or importance or value; direct and immediate rather than secondhand;

Not derived from or reducible to something else; basic;

Most important element;

Of or being the essential or basic part;

Of primary importance;