Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ rocks, minerals, crystals, and gemstones — with properties, formation, colors, hardness, and how to tell them apart.
Agate
A banded variety of chalcedony quartz, famed for its colorful concentric layers and enormous range of patterns and colors.
mineralMaligano Jasper
A rare Indonesian jasper from Sulawesi known for ghostly tube structures, brecciated patterns, and contrasting grey, red, and purple zones.
mineral
Thulite
A pink, manganese-rich variety of zoisite used as an ornamental gemstone, often mottled with white quartz and grey matrix.
gemstone
Rutile
Rutile is a major titanium ore and the famous golden needle inclusion that gives rutilated quartz its shimmering threads.
mineral
Chrysocolla
A vivid blue-green hydrated copper silicate, soft on its own but prized as a gem when hardened by intergrown quartz or chalcedony.
mineralPaintbrush Jasper
A scenic jasper whose flowing streaks of warm color resemble strokes left by a loaded paintbrush.
mineral
Blue Tourmaline
Tourmaline in blue tones, encompassing iron-colored indicolite and the rare neon copper-bearing Paraiba, among the scarcer tourmaline colors.
gemstoneGrape Garnet
A trademarked deep purple-red rhodolite garnet from India, named for its rich grape-like color from the pyrope-almandine series.
gemstone
Quilpie Opal
Boulder opal from the Quilpie district of Queensland, Australia, with bright color set in dark ironstone matrix.
gemstoneOutback Jasper
An earthy Australian-style jasper in red, ochre, and yellow tones evoking the colors of the Outback desert.
mineral
Bronzite
An iron-rich orthopyroxene prized for its warm bronze schiller, a metallic-looking sheen created by tiny mineral inclusions.
mineral
Mahogany Obsidian
A natural volcanic glass with rich brown and black mahogany-like swirls created by iron oxide inclusions.
igneous
Bumblebee Jasper
A vivid yellow-and-black banded stone from Indonesian volcanic vents, colored by sulfur, arsenic minerals and iron oxides, not true jasper.
sedimentary
Fire Agate
A rare brown chalcedony containing thin iron-oxide layers that produce flashing, fiery rainbow iridescence like trapped flames.
gemstone
Star Garnet
A rare almandine garnet that displays a four- or six-rayed star (asterism) from oriented rutile inclusions; the state gem of Idaho.
gemstone
Peridot
The gem-quality green variety of olivine, peridot is colored by iron and is one of the few gems found in only one color.
gemstone
Cave Creek Jasper
An opaque jasper from the Cave Creek area of Arizona, prized for earthy mottled and banded patterns in warm desert tones.
mineralPolychrome Jasper
A warm earth-toned jasper from Madagascar in flowing reds, oranges and golds, also called desert jasper, discovered in the early 2000s.
gemstoneWillow Creek Jasper
A prized Idaho jasper known for porcelain-smooth pastel pinks, creams, and greens in soft swirling, orbicular patterns.
mineral
Demantoid Garnet
A rare green andradite garnet famed for fire exceeding diamond and distinctive horsetail inclusions in Russian stones.
gemstone
Strawberry Garnet
A bright strawberry-red garnet, typically an almandine-pyrope blend prized for its juicy, lively red color in jewelry.
gemstone
Glauconite
A soft, green iron-potassium mica that forms in marine sediments and gives greensand its characteristic olive color.
mineral
Landscape Opal
A common opal containing dendritic or mossy mineral inclusions that form miniature landscape-like scenes inside the stone.
gemstone
Nephrite
One of the two jade minerals, an amphibole prized for its extreme toughness and soft, waxy green hues used in carving for millennia.
gemstone