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.
Boeseman's Rainbowfish
Boeseman's Rainbowfish is a vividly two-toned freshwater fish from New Guinea, with a blue-violet front half and a fiery orange-yellow rear half.
freshwater
Ballan Wrasse
The largest wrasse in northern European waters, a stout rocky-reef fish with highly variable green, brown, or reddish mottling.
saltwater
Balao
A slender, silvery halfbeak with a needle-like lower jaw that schools near the surface of warm Atlantic waters.
pelagic
American Eel
The American Eel spends most of its life in North American rivers and estuaries before migrating once to the Sargasso Sea to spawn and die.
freshwater
Arctic Char
A cold-adapted char of circumpolar northern waters, showing extremely variable coloration and body form across isolated lake and anadromous populations.
freshwater
Raccoon Butterflyfish
A round, orange-and-white butterflyfish with a black mask-like eye band, named for its raccoon-like facial markings.
reef
Kuhli Loach
An eel-like, nocturnal loach with a banded body that burrows through substrate in streams across Southeast Asia.
freshwater
Scrawled Filefish
The Scrawled Filefish is a large, thin-bodied filefish covered in unique blue and black scribbled lines and spots, found drifting near reefs in tropical seas worldwide.
reef
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
Pearl Danio
A slender, iridescent danio with a shifting pearly sheen of blue, pink, and gold along its flanks, native to fast-flowing Southeast Asian streams.
freshwater
Mexican Tetra
A resilient silvery tetra native to Texas and Mexico, renowned for cave populations that lost their eyes and pigment through evolution in total darkness.
freshwater
Green Terror
A robust, iridescent-green South American cichlid whose bold turquoise spangling and feisty temperament earned it its combative common name.
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.
saltwaterWinter Flounder
The winter flounder is a small, right-eyed flatfish of the northwest Atlantic, named for its habit of moving into shallow coastal bays during the colder months.
saltwater
Pacific Blackdragon
An eel-like deep-sea dragonfish whose females are entirely jet-black with a long chin barbel, while the tiny, non-feeding males look almost nothing like them.
deepsea
Midas Cichlid
A large, variably colored Central American cichlid, ranging from mottled gray to solid gold-orange, known for its bold and often combative nature.
freshwater
Cuban Gar
A large, endemic Cuban gar with a broad alligator-like snout, now considered vulnerable due to its restricted freshwater range on the island.
freshwater
Jacksmelt
A larger, long-bodied silverside found along the California and Baja coasts, often schooling in bays and nearshore waters alongside the smaller Topsmelt.
saltwater
Yellow Stingray
A small, boldly patterned stingray of the western Atlantic and Caribbean, often seen resting on sand near coral reefs and seagrass beds in shallow, clear water.
reefMexican Lamprey
The Mexican lamprey is a jawless fish endemic to freshwater rivers of the central Mexican highlands, one of the few lamprey species found so far south in North America.
freshwater
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.
cartilaginousSloane's Viperfish
A slender deep-sea predator armed with needle-like fangs so long they cannot close inside its mouth, along with a light-tipped dorsal spine used to lure prey close.
deepsea
Silver Bream
A silvery European freshwater fish with notably large, protruding eyes, often confused with young Common Bream but distinguished by its larger scales.
freshwater
Sepik Rainbowfish
A deep-bodied rainbowfish from the floodplain lakes and swamps of the Sepik River in Papua New Guinea, covered in unusually fine, numerous scales.
freshwater