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.
Sterba's Corydoras
A popular armored catfish with a spotted body and bright orange pectoral fins, native to river tributaries along the Brazil-Bolivia border.
freshwater
Tomato Clownfish
A deep-bodied, orange-red anemonefish with a single white head bar, living in close partnership with a host sea anemone.
reef
Stonefish
The estuarine stonefish is a heavily camouflaged, warty bottom-dweller of Indo-Pacific mudflats and estuaries, considered one of the most venomous fish known.
brackish
Torpedo Ray
The largest of the electric rays, a powerful bottom-dweller capable of delivering an electric shock strong enough to stun sizeable fish.
cartilaginous
Stone Loach
The Stone Loach is a small, mottled bottom-dwelling fish common in clear European streams, often hiding under stones by day.
freshwaterTotoaba
A critically endangered giant drum endemic to the Gulf of California, notable as one of the largest members of the Sciaenidae family.
saltwater
Steephead Parrotfish
A large Indo-Pacific parrotfish named for its abruptly steep, blunt forehead, typically seen grazing algae and reef rock along outer reef slopes in small groups.
reef
Two-spot Goby
A small sand-dwelling goby known for the two large false eyespots on its raised dorsal fin, which mimic a crab's eyes to startle predators.
reef
Tiger Tail Seahorse
A Southeast Asian reef seahorse easily recognized by the bold alternating light and dark stripes banding its prehensile tail, resembling a tiger's pattern.
reef
Twig Catfish
The Twig Catfish is an extraordinarily thin, elongated armored catfish that mimics a floating twig or plant stem to avoid predators.
freshwater
Threespot Dascyllus
A robust black-bodied damselfish bearing three white spots in youth, one of the most widespread dascyllus species on Indo-Pacific reefs.
reef
Uaru
A large, deep-bodied Amazonian cichlid known for a dramatic color change with age, from a striped juvenile pattern to a mottled brown adult, and for a rare parenting behavior in which parents feed their fry a body-slime secretion.
freshwater
Talbot's Damselfish
A small damselfish with a yellow head, a pale lavender-grey body, and a distinctive black spot on the rear dorsal fin, found sheltering among branching coral on western Pacific reefs.
reef
Turbot
Turbot is a large, diamond-shaped left-eyed flatfish known for its rough, scaleless skin studded with bony tubercles and its camouflaged sandy coloration.
saltwater
Tanganyika Goby
A small, goby-shaped cichlid endemic to Lake Tanganyika's rocky shallows, grazing algae from wave-washed rocks and instantly recognizable by its blunt head and bottom-hugging posture.
freshwater
Tuna
A fast, powerfully built open-ocean fish capable of high-speed sustained swimming, ranging across warm and temperate seas worldwide in large migratory schools.
pelagic
Sturgeon
An ancient family of large, armored bony fish with bony scutes instead of scales and a shark-like barbeled snout. Sturgeon migrate between rivers and the sea to spawn and are among the most endangered fish groups.
brackish
Tub Gurnard
The largest common European gurnard, with a reddish armored body and enormous, brilliantly blue-green pectoral fins that it spreads when disturbed.
saltwater
Thick-lipped Gourami
A small, hardy Myanmar labyrinth fish closely related to the Dwarf Gourami, distinguished by its noticeably thickened lips and reddish-blue diagonal banding in breeding males.
freshwater
Turquoise Killifish
A vividly colored annual killifish from southeastern Africa's temporary pools, notable for having the shortest lifespan of any known vertebrate, typically just a few months in the wild.
freshwater
Striped Catfish
An eel-shaped Indo-Pacific reef catfish marked with pale longitudinal stripes, whose juveniles form dense, tightly packed schooling balls over sand and reef flats.
reef
Southern Bluefin Tuna
A large, deep-bodied tuna of the Southern Hemisphere's open oceans, distinguished by very short pectoral fins and a single spawning ground south of Indonesia.
pelagic
Threadfin Butterflyfish
A widespread Indo-Pacific butterflyfish identified by a pale yellow body, dark diagonal stripes, a black eye-band, and a distinctive trailing filament on the rear dorsal fin.
reef
Spanish Hogfish
A colorful western-Atlantic wrasse with a purple-blue upper front and yellow rear, and a well-known juvenile cleaning habit.
reef
Taimen
Taimen are the largest member of the salmon family, a giant freshwater predator native to remote rivers of Siberia and Mongolia that can live for decades and grow to well over a meter long.
freshwater
Snook
A sleek, silvery predator with a bold black lateral stripe and a distinctive sloped, pointed snout, closely tied to mangrove shorelines and warm coastal estuaries.
brackish
Vermilion Rockfish
A vivid orange-red rockfish of Pacific coast reefs, often called 'red snapper' informally by anglers despite being unrelated to true snappers.
saltwater
Snowy Grouper
A dark gray-brown deepwater grouper of the western Atlantic; juveniles are boldly marked with white spots that fade to a plainer, darker pattern in large adults.
deepseaSplake
Splake are a fertile hybrid char produced by crossing brook trout and lake trout, combining the fast growth of brook trout with the longevity and deep-water habits of lake trout.
freshwater
Sixgill Shark
A massive, ancient-lineage deep-sea shark with six gill slits instead of the usual five, found from shallow fjords to depths beyond 2,000 m.
deepseaCorvina
A large silvery weakfish native to the Gulf of California, best known by its bright orange mouth lining and countershaded body.
saltwater
Star Puffer
One of the largest pufferfish species, the star puffer is covered edge-to-edge in small black spots and roams Indo-Pacific reefs and lagoons feeding on sponges, tunicates, and hard-shelled prey.
reefBristlemouth
A tiny, worldwide deep-sea fish of the genus Cyclothone believed to be the most numerous vertebrate on Earth by sheer population size.
deepsea
Spotted Bass
A compact black bass species with rows of small dark spots below the lateral line, native to the Mississippi and Gulf drainages and often found alongside Largemouth and Smallmouth Bass.
freshwaterSnyder's Moray
A little-seen, plain brownish moray restricted to deep rocky reefs off California and Baja California, rarely encountered due to its preference for depths well beyond typical diving range.
reef
Spotfin Lionfish
A true lionfish with elongated, spotted pectoral fin rays and reddish-brown bars, found resting in reef crevices by day across the Indo-Pacific.
reefKorean Lamprey
The Korean lamprey is a small, non-parasitic jawless fish native to freshwater streams of the Korean Peninsula, feeding only during a long larval stage before a brief adult life.
freshwater
Sparkling Gourami
A tiny, jewel-like Southeast Asian gourami covered in iridescent blue-green spangling and reddish stripes, small enough to be one of the smallest gouramis kept in aquariums.
freshwaterBluntnose Flyingfish
A small flyingfish with a short, blunt snout and large wing-like pectoral fins, gliding above the open tropical Atlantic.
pelagic
Star Drum
One of the smallest drums in the western Atlantic, an elongated silvery fish often found in dense schools over soft coastal bottoms.
saltwaterBearded Croaker
A small South American croaker easily recognized by the single sensory barbel on its chin, an unusual trait among drums.
saltwater
Starry Flounder
The starry flounder is a distinctive North Pacific flatfish recognized by alternating orange and black bands across its fins and rough, star-shaped scales, and notable for tolerating a wide range of salinities.
brackishDesert Rainbowfish
A hardy rainbowfish subspecies adapted to the arid rivers and isolated springs of central Australia, able to withstand extreme temperature swings and prolonged drought.
freshwater
Splash Tetra
A small South American tetra famous for its extraordinary reproductive behavior of leaping out of water in pairs to lay eggs on overhanging leaves.
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
Spotted Seahorse
The spotted seahorse, also called the yellow seahorse, is a widespread Indo-Pacific species with a smooth body, low coronet, and highly variable coloring that ranges from plain yellow to dark blotched patterns.
reefSpeckled Flounder
A small, left-eyed flatfish of the tropical eastern Pacific, named for the fine speckled pattern covering its upper body.
saltwater
Staghorn Sculpin
A common bottom-dwelling sculpin of Pacific coast bays and estuaries, named for the large branching (antler-like) spine on its gill cover.
brackish