Prim's and Kruskal's algorithms are greedy algorithms used to find minimum spanning trees in graphs. Prim's algorithm builds the spanning tree by repeatedly adding the shortest edge that connects to the current tree. Kruskal's algorithm builds the tree by repeatedly adding the shortest edge that does not create a cycle. Both algorithms are used for applications like network design, cluster analysis, and map routing. The key difference is that Prim's starts from a node while Kruskal's starts from the minimum edge, making Prim's faster for dense graphs and Kruskal's faster for sparse graphs.