There is one main difference between their targetted reuse:
.pro
This is usually called Project File.
.pri
This is usually called Project Include File.
As you can see in their names, the main difference is that .pri files are meant to be include files. That is similar to including modules in programming language to share the functionality, essentially.
You will be able to write the common settings and code into those .pri files and include them from several .pro files as the need arises. This is how you would use it in practice: