People get confused with thriller, suspense, mystery all the time. Yes, they can crossover and get muddled, but they are each their own separate genre. Here's how to tell the diff in a nutshell:
Thriller: There is a conspiracy to blow up a group of people and someone has to save the world/community/group that is threatened.
Suspense: One person is in danger of being blown up and we know who is going to do the deed, but the person being blown up doesn't have a clue... and the clock is ticking.
Mystery: Someone has already been blown up and we have to figure out "who done it" and how.
My 2 cents.
Pretty simple, eh?... Not quite.
That looks like 3 sense to me...
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I don't come across "suspense" as a genre much. It's usually a mystery or a thriller. Hitchcock, for example, was described as the master of suspense, but most of his films were thrillers. It makes more sense to me to think of suspense as an essential element of the thriller.
Who said it's simple?