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From Wikipedia:

The ionization energy (IE) is qualitatively defined as the amount of energy required to remove the most loosely bound electron of an isolated gaseous atom to form a cation.

and:

Work function is the energy required to strip an electron from a solid to just outside its surface.

Then why the first ionization energy is not identical to the work function? (there is roughly a factor of 1.5 between the two quantities)

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    $\begingroup$ Duplicate? physics.stackexchange.com/questions/205310/… $\endgroup$
    – Farcher
    Commented Feb 7, 2016 at 23:12
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    $\begingroup$ @Farcher the answer in the question you link to does not answer the question actually, only repeats definitions. $\endgroup$
    – Sparkler
    Commented Feb 7, 2016 at 23:23

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For condensed matter the important value is the Fermi energy; this depends upon the material structure, and is a many body problem.

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    $\begingroup$ This is the right answer but perhaps you could explain to the OP what is the Fermi sea… $\endgroup$
    – user154997
    Commented Jun 5, 2017 at 9:40

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