what is the difference in a recreational pilot and private pilot certificates?

Hi

Recreational license only allows you to take off from one airport, fly within 50 nautical miles of that airport and land at the airport you started with. Also you are restricted from flying out of airports with control towers. You can not fly higher than 10,000 feet or at night. Only allowed to fly 180 HP, fixed gear, 4 seater airplanes. You can only take one passenger with you, regardless of how many seats are in the airplane.

Private lets you go from one airport and allows you to land at other airports, crossing all types of airspace and airports. You can fly as high as the plane is capable going (you need an Instrument Flight plan filed to go higher than 18,000 feet), you can fly at night, you can fly planes that have a Maximum take off weight up to 12,500 and up to 8 passenger seats (not 100% sure on this one), you can take as many people as the plane can fit. Additionally the Private pilot license is used as a stepping stone to higher ratings(such as Instrument, High power, complex)/licenses and you can fly for business purposes and you can even fly internationally (not sure if you can do this with the Recreational).

Instrument rating allows you to fly through bad weather, through clouds. But keep in mind, that even with an instrument rating, there are some weather conditions that you can not fly through, like heavy winds that your plane may not be able to sustain, icing as a lot of planes do not have de-icers, and thunderstorms. But if it is a warm rainy day or a heavy fog day, you would be able to file an Instrument Flight plan and fly through it. Like I said before, you need to add this onto the Private. As of recently, the FAA allowed applicants to combine both of these into one course, Private Pilot with Instrument rating.

If you are looking for an alternative to the Private Pilot license. Another entry level license is the Sport Pilot License. In that, you can fly from any airport to any airport. You can fly to airports with control towers after some additional training is complete post license. You can not fly at night, you can not fly for business, and you can fly aircraft with a maximum take off weight of 1320 lbs. You are limited to 2 seater airplanes and one passenger. You can not fly internationally with this, and can not fly higher than 10,000 ft (or 2000 feet above ground, whichever is higher). You can use your Drivers license in lieu of an FAA Medical (which is required for Rec/Private).

Hope this helps. Best of luck.