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.
Knife Livebearer
A slender Central American livebearer named for the sharp, blade-like keel along its belly, an adaptation believed to aid rapid escape jumps.
freshwater
Grayling
A slender freshwater salmonid relative famed for its tall, sail-like dorsal fin, native to cold, clear rivers of Europe.
freshwater
Inland Silverside
A small, slender silverside native to Gulf and Atlantic coastal waters, notable for tolerating a wide range of salinities from brackish estuaries to inland reservoirs.
brackish
Green Spotted Puffer
A small, popular aquarium puffer with a bright green, black-spotted back and white belly, native to brackish estuaries and mangrove creeks across Southeast Asia.
brackish
Honeycomb Cowfish
A boxy, rigid-bodied cowfish of the tropical western Atlantic, its bluish-green scales outlined in dark hexagonal borders creating a honeycomb pattern, with a pair of forward-pointing horns above the eyes.
reef
Green Sunfish
A hardy, aggressive small sunfish with a large mouth and dark greenish-blue body marked with yellow-green flecking, tolerant of poor water conditions where few other sunfish can survive.
freshwater
Lacustrine Rainbowfish
A brilliant turquoise-blue rainbowfish endemic to Lake Kutubu in Papua New Guinea, now considered endangered due to pollution linked to nearby natural gas extraction.
freshwater
Giant Oceanic Manta Ray
The largest ray in the world, a black-and-white filter feeder with enormous triangular pectoral fins and distinctive cephalic lobes used to funnel plankton into its mouth.
cartilaginous
Kokanee Salmon
Kokanee are a landlocked, non-migratory form of sockeye salmon that spend their entire life in freshwater lakes, turning bright red during their autumn spawning run into tributary streams.
freshwater
Green Sturgeon
The green sturgeon is the most marine-adapted North American sturgeon, ranging widely along the Pacific coast and entering rivers only occasionally to spawn.
saltwater
Jack Dempsey
A robust Central American cichlid named after a boxing champion for its feisty temperament, known for iridescent blue-green speckling that develops as it matures.
freshwater
Hi Fin Red Banded Goby
A tiny white goby marked with thin red diagonal bands and a tall, flag-like yellow dorsal fin, seen hovering above its burrow that it shares with a snapping shrimp.
reef
Houndfish
A large, elongated needlefish with a crocodile-like beak of sharp teeth, found cruising just below the surface of warm coastal waters worldwide in search of small fish.
saltwaterGulper Eel
A bizarre deep-sea eel with a massively oversized, hinged jaw and a whip-like tail far longer than its body, adapted to swallow prey larger than itself in the food-scarce abyss.
deepsea
Japanese Anchovy
A small, abundant schooling fish found throughout the coastal waters of Japan, Korea, and China, the Japanese Anchovy is one of the most heavily fished species in the western Pacific and a vital link in regional marine food webs.
pelagic
Hatchetfish
Hatchetfish are small, silvery deep-sea fish named for their laterally compressed, blade-like body and large upward-pointing tubular eyes adapted to detect faint light above.
deepsea
Japanese Amberjack
The Japanese Amberjack, or yellowtail, is a streamlined pelagic jack from the northwestern Pacific, identified by its bright yellow lateral stripe and yellow-tinged fins.
pelagic
Harlequin Rasbora
A small, deep-bodied freshwater fish with a coppery-orange body and a distinctive black triangular patch covering the rear half, native to the blackwater streams of Southeast Asia.
freshwater
Kawakawa
A compact, fast schooling tuna of the Indo-Pacific with a wavy dark pattern on its back and several distinctive dark spots between the pectoral and pelvic fins.
pelagic
Guineafowl Pufferfish
The Guineafowl Pufferfish is a variably colored reef puffer, most often dark brown to black with small white spots, resembling the plumage of a guineafowl bird.
reef
Immaculate Puffer
A plain, unmarked Indo-Pacific puffer with a smooth grayish-brown body, subtle pale belly, and dark rings around the eyes, often found over sandy and muddy coastal habitats.
saltwater
Hardyhead Silverside
A robust, silvery schooling fish common in shallow lagoons and reef flats across the Indo-Pacific, identified by its broad head and prominent silver midline stripe.
saltwater
Kelp Bass
The kelp bass is a mottled olive-brown temperate reef fish closely tied to kelp forests along the eastern Pacific coast, often seen hovering near kelp fronds and rocky structure.
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
Florida Pompano
A deep-bodied, silvery fish with a forked tail and yellow-tinged fins, common in sandy surf zones along the western Atlantic coast.
saltwater
Honey Gourami
A small, peaceful South Asian labyrinth fish whose breeding males flush a warm honey-gold to orange color with a dark throat and belly, making it a popular gentle community fish.
freshwater
Fingerprint Filefish
The Fingerprint Filefish is a small reef filefish with a dark head, orange-brown body marked by fine irregular lines, and a bright orange tail.
reef
Haddock
A slender, silvery-grey relative of the cod, easily recognized by a distinctive black lateral line and a dark thumbprint-like blotch above the pectoral fin.
saltwater
Flathead Catfish
A massive, flat-headed catfish with a mottled yellow-brown body and a protruding lower jaw, known for its solitary, ambush-predator lifestyle in large river systems.
freshwater
Guitarfish
A shark-like ray with a flattened, guitar-shaped body that blends features of sharks and rays, common on sandy coastal seabeds of the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.
cartilaginous
Fairy Wrasse
A dazzling small reef wrasse in which males flash iridescent shades of red, purple, and blue during courtship displays over coral rubble and reef slopes.
reefHilsa Shad
An anadromous herring of the Bay of Bengal region, the Hilsa Shad undertakes long migrations up rivers such as the Ganges and Padma to spawn and holds major cultural significance across South Asia.
brackish
Fathead Minnow
A small, hardy North American minnow famous as baitfish and a standard toxicology test species, able to survive low-oxygen, turbid water most fish avoid.
freshwaterGulf Hagfish
The Gulf hagfish is a small, jawless scavenger found in deep offshore waters of the Gulf of Mexico, living on soft sediment far below the sunlit zone.
deepsea
Far Eastern Brook Lamprey
A small, jawless, non-parasitic lamprey native to clear freshwater streams across Japan, Korea, and mainland East Asia, spending most of its life as a burrowing larva before a brief non-feeding adult stage.
freshwater
Hogchoker
A small, tough-skinned estuarine sole tolerant of fresh to salt water, with a mottled brown crossbanded body, rounded outline, and no visible pectoral fins.
brackish
Fiji Blue Devil
A striking blue-headed, yellow-bodied damselfish endemic to the coral reefs of Fiji and nearby South Pacific islands.
reef
Firefish
The Firefish is a slender, white-to-orange goby-like fish with a tall sail-like dorsal fin, known for hovering above its burrow and darting inside when startled.
reef
Firemouth Cichlid
A Central American cichlid famous for the fiery red-orange throat it flares open to intimidate rivals during territorial disputes.
freshwater
Forktail Rainbowfish
A tiny, colorful blue-eye rainbowfish from New Guinea named for its distinctively forked, yellow-edged tail fin.
freshwater
Flowery Flounder
An Indo-Pacific reef-associated flatfish densely covered in small blue rings and spots, giving a flower-like pattern, with both eyes on its upper left side.
reef
Freshwater Moray
An unusual moray that spends much of its adult life in rivers and estuaries rather than the sea, identified by its slender olive-brown body and fine dark mottling.
brackish
Freshwater Drum
The Freshwater Drum is the only entirely freshwater member of the drum family, recognized by its humpbacked silvery body and tail-extending lateral line.
freshwater
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
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
Gardner's Killifish
A small, brilliantly colored non-annual killifish from West African forest streams, with males showing an iridescent steel-blue body dotted with red spots and a lyre-shaped tail.
freshwater
Ghost Pipefish
Ghost pipefish are small, camouflaged reef fish related to true pipefish, named for their ability to nearly vanish against crinoids, algae, and seagrass. The family includes several species distinguished by body shape and coloration.
reef
Giant Mudskipper
The largest common mudskipper species, a heavy-bodied, predatory amphibious goby that patrols mangrove mudflats across South and Southeast Asia.
brackish