Answer
Both are crimes against property, but they differ in how the property is taken. Theft (Article 308) is taking another's property without consent and with intent to gain. Estafa (Article 315) is obtaining property or causing damage through deceit or abuse of confidence — the offender usually receives the property lawfully and then misappropriates it, or induces the transfer by fraud.
A common line: if the offender takes the thing without the owner's consent, it is theft; if the owner parts with it because of deceit or under a trust the offender then violates, it is estafa. The full report compares the two.
Researching Philippine law? Intellegal brings Philippine case-law search, statute and issuance exploration, multi-dimension case comparison, document visualization, and cited deep-research reports into a single workflow — with every citation traced back to its original source, so you can verify each answer rather than take it on trust. Every authority it surfaces links back to its original provision or decision, so you can open the source and confirm the wording yourself, and save or export the questions and reports you reference most. See the full report for the statutes and cases behind this answer, or explore the related questions below.