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The INTJ and INFJ personality types are rare and distinctive, making them difficult for people to understand and relate to. If you are an INTJ or INFJ or have frequent contact with one of these personalities, it can help you to know and understand more about their unique characteristics.
Let’s explore the key differences between INTJ and INFJ personalities.
What Is the INTJ Personality Type?
The INTJ personality type is known as the Architect. Their key characteristics are:
Introverted
The first preference indicates where people tend to direct and receive their energy. Introverts prefer to channel their energy inward toward ideas, information, and beliefs.
Introverts prefer doing things alone or with just one or two people they know and trust. Introverts usually think and plan before they act or speak and sometimes like the idea of something better than the thing itself.
INtuiting
The second psychological preference indicates the way a person prefers to receive information. An intuiting person pays more attention to information patterns, impressions, and underlying meaning.
They learn by thinking things through and exploring the implications of new information. They mentally explore symbols, theories, and abstractions and remember ideas and concepts better than factual details.
Thinking
The third preference indicates the way a person prefers to make decisions. A thinking person makes decisions based on facts and data, striving for objectivity.
They try to reach decisions that are universally applicable and useful all the time in every similar situation. They look for fundamental truths, underlying principles, and consistent practices without personal influence.
Judging
The final preference indicator refers to how a person deals with the outside world. For example, a person with a judging personality prefers a structured life, concrete plans, and firm decisions. They make step-by-step plans, keep to-do lists and schedules, and exercise control over their life and time.
These preferences make the INTJ highly independent, confident, and analytical. They emphasize facts and logic, prioritize information over emotion, and prefer structure and order but make their own rules.
An INTJ is innovative and creative, known for being a perfectionist who is seldom satisfied with the status quo. They are often critical and blunt and would rather be right than popular, which limits their social success.
What Is the INFJ Personality Type?
The INFJ personality type is the Advocate, a personality type full of contradictions. Their key characteristics are:
Introverted
The first preference indicates where people tend to direct and receive their energy. Introverts prefer to channel their energy inward toward ideas, information, and beliefs.
Introverts prefer doing things alone or with just one or two people they know and trust. Introverts usually think and plan before they act or speak and sometimes like the idea of something better than the thing itself.
INtuiting
The second psychological preference indicates the way a person prefers to receive information. An intuiting person pays more attention to information patterns, impressions, and underlying meaning.
They learn by thinking things through and exploring the implications of new information. They mentally explore symbols, theories, and abstractions and remember ideas and concepts better than factual details.
Feeling
The third preference indicates the way a person prefers to make decisions. A feeling person makes decisions by considering the perspectives and opinions of everyone involved and tries to create a harmonious outcome.
Moreover, they want to deeply understand the feelings of the people around them and reach a peaceful resolution. They know that no two different situations will have the same solution because other people and different feelings will be involved.
Judging
The final preference indicator refers to how a person deals with the outside world. For example, a person with a judging personality prefers a structured life, concrete plans, and firm decisions. They make step-by-step plans, keep to-do lists and schedules, and exercise control over their life and time.
The Advocate is thoughtful, imaginative, and has high principles in life. They tend to be guided by an inner vision that makes them independent of others and willing to go their own way to pursue their values.
Although their sense of values and purpose is exceptionally high and uncompromising, they are often relaxed and easygoing with others. They balance creativity with analysis, logic with emotion, and quiet sensitivity with extremely high standards.
What Do INTJ and INFJ Personalities Have in Common?
INTJ and INFJ personality types have quite a lot in common. For example, these types both share these characteristics:
1. Quiet and Introspective
As intuitive introverts, both of these personality types value deep, quiet thinking and analysis. They use their thoughts to understand concepts, principles, and fundamental ideas and analyze their inner lives for meaning.
2. Creative Visionaries
INTJ and INFJ personalities are interested in potentials and possibilities, with big visions and unconventional solutions. They aren’t constrained by the practical and ordinary and aim for big dreams and sweeping goals.
3. Organized and Structured
These personality types know that you can’t accomplish your dreams without planning, and they are reliable planners. This ability to combine big imaginative goals with detailed and methodical follow-through makes these personality types incredibly impactful and influential in their chosen sphere.
Many famous INTJs are great examples of the personality type, including Warren Buffet, Elon Musk, and Margaret Thatcher. Examine what they have in common with famous INFJs like Bjork, Vincent van Gogh, and Angela Merkel to understand how these types are similar.
6 Key Differences Between the INTJ and INFJ Personality
Despite these similarities, there are several fundamental ways in which an INTJ and an INFJ differ. Here are the most significant differences between INTJ and INFJ personality types:
1. Personality Type Frequency
INTJ: 2-4% overall. INFJ: 1-3% overall
INFJ is the rarest personality type among all Americans, while INTJ is the rarest personality type among women. Only about 1% of American women are INTJ personalities. Because these personality types are so uncommon, and their introversion makes them difficult to get to know, it can be challenging for most people to befriend and understand INFJ personality types.
2. Independent vs. Cooperative
Independent: INTJ. An INTJ is most interested in their ideas and principles and willing to pursue them regardless of what others are doing. They are also unwilling to follow the crowd or observe traditions that they think are meaningless, making these types incredibly independent, to the point of isolation.
Cooperative: INFJ. While an INFJ will stand up for what they think is right, even if they are the only one, this personality type also values harmony and cooperation. An INFJ values their relationships and prefers to cooperate with others.
3. Exacting vs. Easygoing
Exacting: INTJ. An INTJ holds themself and others to an incredibly high standard and tends to think that their decisions are right, true, and rational, and anyone who disagrees is simply wrong. Their keen intellect and observations mean that they are often correct, but their perfectionism can also be too demanding and occasionally controlling.
Easygoing: INFJ. An INFJ personality prefers to get along with others. When there is disagreement, they may attempt to persuade others to their point of view but may just go along with others rather than be critical or engage in conflict.
4. Arrogant vs. Altruistic
Arrogant: INTJ. The typical INTJ has incredible confidence in their thoughts and beliefs and tends to believe they are right about most things. But unfortunately, this self-confidence and independence can lead to a bossy, arrogant demeanor.
Altruistic: INFJ. The INFJ may believe they are correct, but they have a warm, sensitive communication style that comes across as friendly and persuasive rather than bossy and arrogant. They are deeply motivated toward the success, happiness, and growth of others and are usually gentle and supportive.
5. Poor Social Skills vs. People-Pleasing
Poor Social Skills: INTJ. People find many characteristics abrasive and challenging about an INTJ due to poor social skills. Their inward focus on their thoughts and ideas and commitment to act on those thoughts regardless of what others do or think to make them unmotivated to connect with others.
There are many social and communication skills that they simply never learn. Much of the perception of this type as difficult, argumentative, and arrogant can be ascribed to their difficulty expressing and explaining themselves.
People-Pleasing: INFJ. The INFJ has excellent social skills and communicates exceptionally well. However, their desire to create peace and harmony often results in self-sacrifice and people-pleasing.
This personality type may struggle to develop healthy boundaries, stand up for themselves when necessary, or be honest when it may cause conflict.
6. Receptive vs. Over-Sensitive
Receptive: INTJ. The bright, curious INTJ is always searching for new information and receptive to correction and feedback. While stubborn when they are correct, they will adapt and change course immediately when they get further information that shows they are wrong.
In addition, they are happy to debate different points of view in their quest for truth and are receptive to disagreement from others.
Over-sensitive: INFJ. The INFJ’s need for harmony and cooperation makes them extremely sensitive and sometimes over-sensitive. They easily have their feelings hurt, react negatively to criticism, and sometimes perceive rejection where none exists.
The main difference between the INTJ and INFJ personalities is the degree to which the feelings and opinions of other people matter to them. The different ways they react to social information and pressures strongly differentiate these two similar types.
Final Thoughts on INTJ and INFJ Personalities
Because these personality types are so rare, so reserved, and have such strong, distinctive characteristics, many people with an INTJ or INFJ in their life will struggle to understand and get along with them. Therefore, it can be beneficial to ask the person to take a personality test and find out the results.
Also, if you often find yourself misunderstood, struggling to communicate, or in similar challenging dynamics with other people over and over again, take a personality test yourself and find out your own MBTI type.
Knowing more about Myers-Briggs and the 16 personalities is a great way to better understand the people around you, especially when there is conflict and difficulty.
Knowing your own, or someone else’s, personality type helps you identify how they prefer to learn new information and how they interact with others. This can help you frame conversations and activities successfully for both of you and promote better harmony and understanding.
These tools are especially valuable within the family and workplace, where creating long-term successful relationships is critical.
Finally, if you want to identify YOUR personality type, then take one of these 11 personality tests to better understand what makes you tick.
