While these two seemingly similar ingredients are often used interchangeably, there’s actually quite a bit of difference between the two. Turmeric is a flowering plant in the ginger family, and its root is dried and ground into a powder to be used as a spice in cooking.  Curcumin, on the other hand, is an active compound found naturally in turmeric which has powerful antioxidant properties. It contains over 200 active compounds and is thought to have even stronger benefits than turmeric itself.