Fish Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ fish species — freshwater, saltwater, reef, and pelagic — with habitat, size, diet, behavior, and how to tell them apart.
Mola Mola
The heaviest bony fish in the world, an enormous, flattened, disc-shaped giant that appears to be missing a tail, often seen basking sideways at the ocean's surface.
pelagic
Flounder
A flatfish with both eyes on its upper side that lies camouflaged against sandy or muddy bottoms, ambushing small fish and invertebrates that pass overhead.
saltwater
Golden Wonder Killifish
A golden-orange color form of the striped panchax, this hardy topminnow patrols the water's surface hunting insects and small fish in South Asian wetlands.
freshwater
Garibaldi
A large, brilliant orange damselfish and the official marine state fish of California, found among rocky reefs and kelp forests of the temperate northeast Pacific.
reef
European Sea Bass
The European sea bass is a sleek, silvery predator common along European and North African coasts, prized by anglers as a hard-fighting sport fish.
saltwater
Bull Rout
Known as the shorthorn sculpin elsewhere, the Bull Rout is a camouflaged, spiny-headed fish common in cold North Atlantic tide pools and rocky shores.
saltwater
Clown Knifefish
A knife-shaped Southeast Asian fish with a distinctive row of large black eyespots along its rear body and a long, continuous ventral fin.
freshwater
Blacktip Shark
A fast, energetic coastal shark named for the black tips on most of its fins, often seen leaping and spinning while chasing schooling fish.
saltwater
Whale Shark
The largest fish in the world, a gentle filter-feeding shark covered in a distinctive checkerboard pattern of pale spots and stripes, found in warm seas worldwide.
cartilaginous
Sea Hagfish
The sea hagfish is a primitive, eel-shaped jawless fish that scavenges on the deep, cold seafloor of the North Atlantic and produces enormous amounts of defensive slime.
deepsea
Reedfish
A snake-bodied African fish with a lung-like breathing organ, related to bichirs, prized for its unusual elongated form and air-breathing ability.
freshwater
Pacific Saury
A slender, silvery, beaked schooling fish of the temperate North Pacific, closely related to needlefish, marked by a row of small finlets near its tail.
pelagic
Pacific Lamprey
The Pacific lamprey is a jawless, anadromous fish with a toothed sucking disc mouth, found along Pacific coastlines from Baja California to Japan and Alaska.
saltwater
Loach Goby
The Loach Goby is an elongated, flat-bodied fish that clings to rocks in fast-flowing Indo-Pacific streams, combining goby and loach-like features.
freshwater
Indo-Pacific Sailfish
The Indo-Pacific sailfish is a large, streamlined billfish famed for its towering, sail-like dorsal fin and status as one of the fastest fish in the ocean.
pelagic
Garfish
A long, silvery, needle-jawed fish of European coastal waters, instantly recognizable by its bright green backbone and slender, beak-like snout.
pelagic
Frigate Mackerel
A small tuna-like fish with a distinctive dark, wavy tiger-stripe pattern on its upper back, found in warm oceanic waters worldwide.
pelagic
Flagtail Prochilodus
The Flagtail Prochilodus is a schooling South American river fish named for its bold red-and-black striped tail fin, which resembles a flag.
freshwater
California Grunion
A slender coastal fish famous for coming fully ashore on sandy California beaches during nighttime spawning runs timed to spring high tides.
saltwater
Blue Reef Chromis
A slender, brilliant blue schooling fish commonly seen hovering in large numbers above coral reef outcrops throughout the Caribbean and western Atlantic.
reef
Blue Tang
A vivid royal-blue reef fish with a black palette-shaped marking and a bright yellow tail, popularized worldwide after appearing in animated film.
reef
American Paddlefish
The American paddlefish is a primitive filter-feeding fish famous for its long, paddle-shaped snout, native to the Mississippi River basin of North America.
freshwater
Zebrafish
A small, striped South Asian minnow renowned worldwide as a key model organism for genetics and developmental biology research, alongside its popularity as an aquarium fish.
freshwaterSleeper Goby
A stout, goby-like estuarine fish that rests motionless on the bottom for long stretches, distinguished from true gobies by its separate (unfused) pelvic fins.
brackish