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The difference is magnitude, how long the distance is.

Physical distance is measured in units like miles and kilometers, and are used for short distances.

Time distance is measured in the distance light travels in a unit of time. The units are usually the kilometers light could travel in one year, and they are used for very long distances.

Light travels 299,792.458 kilometers in one second. Then it must travel 60 times as far in one minute, 60 X 60 times as far in one hour, 60 X 60 X 24 in one day, and 60 X 60 X 24 X 365 in one year.

In other words light travels 60 X 60 X 24 X 365 X 299,792.458 kilometers in one year. That is 9,454,354,955,000,000 kilometers. That number is so huge that it is much easier to say one light year.

Alpha Centauri the nearest star to our solar system is approximately 4.22 light years away. Our galaxy the Milky Way is approximately 100,000 light years long.

Using a distance measurement would be terribly cumbersome for interstellar distances or the distance between galaxies (intergalactic distances) which are even larger, so we use time distances.

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