what is the difference between gum paste and fondant?

To sum it all up, gumpaste dries quicker while fondant takes a while. That being said, it is best to use gumpaste to make decorations and fondant for covering the whole cake.

There are lots of existing threads which have already covered this!

To add to Rylan's post. You can also roll gp a lot thinner than fondant which is great to make such things as flowers more realistic looking.

Also, fondant is for eating and gumpaste is not. Gumpaste is technically edible but it dries rock hard. Fondant, on a cake at least, stays soft enough that you can cut it and chew it easily.

GP is usually used for modeling figures and making flowers.
For figures, it dries faster & harder. Many people mix GP w/fondant if they are not real fast w/making figures as the added fondant slows down the drying of GP allowing you to work fine details before it drys.
For flowers you can roll it much thinner to get more real looking ones.
To eat it would be like eating an egg shell - hard & very crunchy.
Lots of us use fondant for decorations on b'cream or fondant covered cakes.

thank you everyone i am new to this and searching for answers