beads vs prayer beads

beads and prayer beads both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
beads	Yes	No	No	No
prayer beads	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, prayer beads is a hyponym of beads; that is, prayer beads is a word with a more specific, narrower meaning than beads:

beads: several beads threaded together on a string
prayer beads: a string of beads used in counting prayers (especially by Catholics)

Other hyponyms of beads include rosary, peag, wampum, wampumpeag.

beads (noun)	prayer beads (noun)
several beads threaded together on a string	a string of beads used in counting prayers (especially by Catholics)