Elasticity of a material can be defined as the ability of a material to regain its original shape after an external force is applied on it. The ratio of stress applied on a body to the strain produced in it is defined as the Young’s modulus of that material.

Now, when we apply equal amounts of stress on steel and rubber having the same cross-sectional area, we notice that compared to steel, rubber gets stretched. The strain produced in rubber is much larger compared to that in steel. This means that steel has a larger value of Young’s modulus of elasticity and hence, steel has more elasticity than rubber.