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.
Coral Grouper
The coral grouper is a vivid orange-red reef fish covered in small electric-blue spots, commonly seen darting among coral heads across the Indo-Pacific.
reef
Slippery Dick
A common small western-Atlantic wrasse with two dark lateral stripes and a small dark spot at the tail base.
reef
Golden Topminnow
A small southeastern U.S. killifish whose males show golden-yellow coloring with iridescent blue-green spotting. It favors quiet, well-vegetated ponds, swamps, and slow backwaters.
freshwater
Coney
The coney is a small, color-variable reef grouper of the tropical western Atlantic, occurring in reddish-brown, bicolor, or bright golden-yellow forms, always marked with fine blue spotting.
reef
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
Croaking Gourami
A small Southeast Asian gourami capable of producing an audible croaking sound using modified pectoral fin muscles, marked with iridescent blue-green stripes and spots along a brownish body.
freshwater
Bleeding Heart Tetra
A deep-bodied upper Amazon characin marked by a small red 'bleeding heart' spot and, in males, a dramatic elongated dorsal fin.
freshwater
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 Shark
A slender, docile reef shark whose striped juveniles transform into leopard-like spotted adults, unmistakable due to its very long tail.
reef
Crevalle Jack
A powerfully built, silvery jack with a steep forehead and a black spot on its gill cover, common along coastal and estuarine waters of the Atlantic.
pelagic
Red Bream
The red bream, or blackspot seabream, is a pink-tinged sparid with a dark shoulder spot that lives over rocky and sandy bottoms in the northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.
saltwater
Merry Widow
A small, peaceful Central American livebearer with a translucent grayish body and a distinctive dark spot near the gill cover, popular among hobbyists for decades.
freshwater
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
Brook Trout
A colorful char native to cold, clear streams of eastern North America, marked by worm-like back markings and red spots haloed in blue along its sides. It is highly sensitive to water quality and temperature.
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
Dragon Wrasse
A reef wrasse whose juveniles mimic drifting algae with wild fin extensions, while adults become stout, green-bodied rock-flippers that hunt buried invertebrates.
reef
Tiger Shark
A large, robust shark named for the dark vertical bars on its flanks, most vivid in juveniles, known for an unusually broad, opportunistic diet.
cartilaginous
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
Ornate Bichir
A striking Central African freshwater fish with an eel-like body covered in an intricate leopard-spot network pattern and a row of spiny finlets along its back.
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
Cubera Snapper
The largest snapper in the Atlantic, a heavy-bodied reef predator with oversized canine teeth. Adults hold near deep ledges and wrecks, while juveniles grow up in mangrove nurseries.
reef
Convict Blenny
An eel-like burrow-dweller whose black-and-white striped juveniles form dense swirling schools near the burrow mouth, while adults hide almost entirely underground.
reef
Manta Ray
The largest ray in the world, a gentle filter-feeding giant with a diamond-shaped body, forward-facing cephalic fins, and unique underside spot patterns used to identify individuals.
cartilaginous
Lane Snapper
A small, silvery-pink schooling snapper marked by faint yellow stripes and a black spot near the tail base, common across shallow Western Atlantic reefs and seagrass.
reef