What is the difference between neutral and earth?

In your home's wiring there are three conductors: live (brown), neutral (blue), and earth (green and yellow stripes). The live conductor carries electricity to your appliances. The neutral carries it back to the supply. Together they form the normal current path. The earth wire doesn't normally carry any current at all. Its job is safety: if a fault develops inside an appliance and the casing becomes live, the earth wire gives that fault current a safe path back to the supply — tripping a fuse or circuit breaker before you get a shock. Think of neutral as the normal return road and earth as the emergency escape route. They are different functions. While neutral and earth connect together at one point (the electricity meter or nearby), they must never be connected together inside your home — doing so can create dangerous situations.