heir vs recipient

heir and recipient both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
heir	Yes	No	No	No
recipient	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, recipient is a hypernym of heir; that is, recipient is a word with a broader meaning than heir:

heir: a person who is entitled by law or by the terms of a will to inherit the estate of another
recipient: a person who receives something

Other hypernyms of heir include receiver.

heir (noun)	recipient (noun)
a person who is entitled by law or by the terms of a will to inherit the estate of another	the semantic role of the animate entity that is passively involved in the happening denoted by the verb in the clause
a person who inherits some title or office	a person who receives something