Field oriented control (FOC) and Direct torque control (DTC) are the two most popular vector control methods for electric motor drives. FOC uses linear controllers and pulse width modulation (PWM) to control the fundamental components of the load voltage. On the other hand, DTC is a nonlinear strategy that directly generates the voltage vectors in the absence of a modulator. This paper presents a comparative study between the two control schemes. The pros and cons of both the methods are separately discussed for two candidate machines: Induction Machine (IM) and Permanent Magnet Synchronous Machine (PMSM). The comparison is based on various criteria including basic control characteristics, dynamic performance, parameter sensitivity, and implementation complexity. The discussion is supported with results from various articles, and a criterion to draw a fair comparison between the performance of the two schemes is also presented.