How do I know whether I'm having a panic attack or just anxious?

Well, sometimes the lines blurred, but an actual panic attack is pretty obvious. Your senses go on overload and you have physical symptoms such as rapid breathing, sweating, clammy hands, racing heart, etc. Panic attacks are hard to miss because they are quite overwhelming. They are also intense and by definition temporary, whereas anxiety can stay with you for a much longer time.

When you are having a panic attack, it is suddenly incredibly hard to breathe. You get really sweaty and feel like you may die. Your panic consumes you and you feel like you can't do anything to distract yourself.

I cannot say for sure; but panic attacks are usually sudden and last up to 20 minutes. You could also say you are anxious as well, since a panic attack is a form of anxiety. I hope you feel better.

Panic attacks have severe physical symptoms, including heart racing, hard to breathe, think you're dying.

An anxiety attack, people may feel fearful, apprehensive, may feel their heart racing or feel short of breath, but it's very short lived, and when the stressor goes away, so does the anxiety attack. Panic attack on the other hand doesn't come in reaction to a stressor. It's unprovoked and unpredictable

When you experience anxiety, you feel nervous and uneasy. You may have some physical symptoms, such as trembling, shivering and uneven breathing. It's very uncomfortable, but still fairly manageable. When you're having a panic attack, you experience all those symptoms tenfold and it's awfully hard to control it. You hyperventilate, your vision might get blurry and it feels like the whole world is sped up. Anxiety is uncomfortable. Panic attacks are destructive.

Anxiety is normally the prolonged feeling of a tight chest or shaking, a panic attack is more sudden and can sometimes happen through a build up or time or to a reaction to an experience. It is important to recognise signs of your anxiety and try and tackle them one by one and over time panic attacks will become less frequent

Panic attacks are similar to anxiety....However with panic attacks people usually struggle to keep there breathing steady and struggle to calm down, so they need help to do so if they can't control it themselves.

If you feel like you cannot breathe and your airway is constricted in some way shape or form it is most likely a panic attack.

When you're having a panic attack, you feel like you can't breath. It feels like all oxygen is being taken from you, but everyone else seems to be doing just fine. When you're being anxious, you, probably, don't feel that way.