The Difference between Cell Culture Plates and ELISA Plates

Cell culture plates are mainly for culture cells, and the culture methods are suspension culture and adherent culture.  And people often used the ELISA plate for protein detection after an ELISA reaction. So, what is the difference between a cell culture plate and an ELISA plate?

greiner 48 well cell culture plateElisa Plates

The different materials of a cell culture plate and an ELISA plate:

ELISA Plate vs. Cell Culture Plate:

  • Cell culture plate material is general PS, which is the same as that of the ELISA plate, but there are essential differences compared with the ELISA plate.
  • The Elisa plate material is general polystyrene (PS), and polystyrene has poor chemical stability and a variety of organic solvents (such as aromatic hydrocarbons, halogenated hydrocarbons, etc.)can dissolve them

The different sizes of a cell culture plate and an ELISA plate:

  • Polystyrene cell culture plate is above 6,12,24,48, 96 well plate cell cultures.
  • The ELISA plate sizes: a 48-well ELISA plate and a 96-well ELISA plate according to the number of wells. Generally, 96-well microplate plates are commonly popular.
  • The detachable ELISA plate means separated the slats on the plate. The separated slats are 12-well strips and 8-well strips and can reuse the frame of the ELISA plate.

The different structures of a cell culture plate and an ELISA plate：

  • It’s actually really easy. People often covered culture plates, while usually uncovering non-detachable  ELISA plates.
  • In addition, the ELISA plate is above a detachable ELISA plate and a non-detachable ELISA plate.
  • For the non-detachable ELISA plate, people connected the slats on the whole plate together, and all the wells are the same.
  • Made by different manufacturers look similar on the whole, but some small details about ELISA plates will be different, such as structure, etc. Cell culture plates are the same.
  • Corroded by strong acid and alkali, not resistant to grease, and easy to change color after being irradiated by ultraviolet light, so pay more attention to the ELISA plate.
  • Since some cell culture plate requires adherent culture, the plates require surface treatment. Otherwise, adherent cells cannot grow on the plate.
  • The gap between the culture plate used to culture bacteria or suspension cells and the non-detachable ELISA plate is very small.
  • Many domestic manufacturers use the general bacterial culture plate as the non-detachable ELISA plate.

 Difference directly- ELISA Plate vs. Cell Culture Plate:

The difference between a cell culture plate and an ELISA plate

  •   ELISA plates are generally more expensive than cell culture plates. According to cell culture plate material, people used cell plates for cell culture and measuring protein concentration;
  •   ELISA plates include coating plates and reaction plates, which are generally not for cell culture. Protein detection after immunoenzyme-linked reaction requires higher requirements and specific enzyme labeling working solution.

A tip about a cell culture plate and an ELISA plate:

Q: I want to measure the absorbance with a microplate reader, can I use a multi-well cell culture plate? What is the difference between a microtiter plate and a multi-well cell culture plate?

A: It is definitely possible to measure the absorbance with a multi-space cell culture plate, and we often use it for protein quantification and MTT detection of samples.

There are more introduces about how to make Elisa plate, how to use ELISA plates, etc.