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.
Spotfin Croaker
A robust surf-zone drum from Southern California and Baja, easily identified by a bold black spot at the base of each pectoral fin.
saltwater
Spotted Gar
A slender North American gar covered in dark spots from head to tail, often seen basking near the surface of quiet, weedy waters.
freshwater
Red-eye Tetra
A hardy, wide-ranging South American characin identified by its striking red iris band and bold black-and-white marked tail base.
freshwater
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
Corkwing Wrasse
A small, colorful European wrasse identified by a dark comma-shaped spot behind the eye and a dark blotch on the tail base.
saltwater
Head and Tail Light Tetra
An Amazon and Guiana river characin named for its glowing metallic eye and tail-base spots, resembling a pair of tiny headlights.
freshwater
Sand Goby
A small, sand-colored goby common on shallow sandy seabeds and estuaries around northern Europe, distinguished by a dark spot at the base of its first dorsal fin.
brackish
Keeltail Needlefish
A slender needlefish easily identified by the raised keel-like ridge on either side of its tail base, found cruising the surface of warm coastal waters worldwide.
saltwater
Goldsinny Wrasse
A small reddish-brown wrasse marked by a black tail-base spot, the Goldsinny Wrasse patrols rocky Atlantic reefs and is known for picking parasites off other fish.
saltwater
Bluespine Unicornfish
A large Indo-Pacific tang with a bony forehead horn and paired fixed blue-white spines at the tail base, browsing brown macroalgae on coral reefs and reef flats.
reef
Sheepshead Bream
The sheepshead bream, or white seabream, is a silvery sparid marked by dark vertical bars and a black tail-base spot, common over rocky reefs and seagrass in the Mediterranean and eastern Atlantic.
reef
Northern Anchovy
A small, slender schooling fish with a pointed snout and large mouth, abundant along the Pacific coast of North America, where it forms a key part of the California Current forage base.
pelagic
Cardinal Tetra
A tiny, jewel-toned freshwater fish with an iridescent blue stripe running the length of its body above a vivid red stripe below, native to the blackwater tributaries of the Amazon.
freshwater
Stoplight Parrotfish
A common Caribbean reef fish whose terminal-phase males show brilliant green bodies with a distinctive yellow spot at the tail base resembling a stoplight.
reef
Tomtate
A small silvery grunt common over reefs and hard-bottom habitats of the western Atlantic, recognized by a dark blotch near the base of its tail fin.
reef
Oscar
A large, intelligent South American cichlid known for its bold personality, striking mottled coloration, and a dark false eyespot near the base of its tail.
freshwater
Gold Dust Molly
A selectively bred molly variety combining a golden-yellow base color with fine black speckling, developed in the aquarium trade from wild Poecilia stock.
freshwater
Whiting
The whiting is a slender, silvery member of the cod family found across northeastern Atlantic shelf seas, easily recognized by the small black blotch at the base of its pectoral fin.
saltwater
Ringtail Surgeonfish
A blue-grey Indo-Pacific tang identified by the narrow white ring encircling its tail base; common on coral and rocky reefs from East Africa to Hawaii.
reef
Blonde Ray
A large European skate named for its pale, sandy coloration, recognized by prominent eye-like spots near the base of each pectoral fin and a preference for sandy coastal seabeds.
cartilaginous
Doubletooth Surgeonfish
A sawtail surgeonfish of the genus Prionurus, marked by rows of forward-angled bony 'teeth' on the tail base instead of a single blade-like spine; found on rocky reefs of the eastern tropical Atlantic.
reef
Pacific Herring
A slender, silvery schooling fish closely related to the Atlantic Herring, found in cold coastal waters across the North Pacific, where it forms a critical forage base for fish, seabirds, and marine mammals.
pelagic
Giant Gourami
The largest gourami species, a deep-bodied Southeast Asian labyrinth fish that can exceed two feet in length and shifts from an insect-eating juvenile diet to a largely plant-based adult diet.
freshwater
Zebra Mbuna
One of the most iconic Lake Malawi cichlids, the zebra mbuna is highly variable in color across populations but typically shows bold barring, and it forms the basis for one of the aquarium hobby's most popular mbuna groups.
freshwater