Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ rocks, minerals, crystals, and gemstones — with properties, formation, colors, hardness, and how to tell them apart.
Sunset Agate
A warmly colored chalcedony agate with reds, oranges, golds, and pinks that blend like the glowing bands of a sunset sky.
gemstoneCloud Agate
A chalcedony agate with soft, billowing cloud-like masses of gray and white suspended in a translucent body.
gemstone
Sweetwater Agate
A translucent Wyoming chalcedony filled with delicate black manganese dendrites that resemble tiny ferns, moss, or starbursts.
gemstone
Black Jasper
A dense, opaque black variety of microcrystalline quartz historically used as a touchstone for testing precious metals.
mineralNoreena Jasper
A rare Australian jasper from the Pilbara with bold red, yellow, and black abstract patterns, prized by collectors.
mineral
Adinole
A fine-grained, sodium-rich contact-metasomatic rock formed where shale is albitized next to intruding diabase or spilite.
metamorphic
Jaspillite
A banded, metamorphosed iron formation in which bright red jasper alternates with silvery hematite or magnetite layers.
metamorphic
Dalmatian Stone
A cream-colored feldspar-and-quartz rock peppered with dark spots, named for its resemblance to a Dalmatian dog.
igneous
Chromite
Chromite is the only commercial ore of chromium, a black iron-chromium oxide of the spinel group found in mafic igneous rocks.
mineral
Franklinite
A black spinel-group zinc iron oxide, essentially unique to Franklin, New Jersey, where it was a key zinc and manganese ore.
mineral
Siderite
Siderite is an iron carbonate ore, a brown rhombohedral mineral of the calcite group found in sediments and veins.
mineral
Lodestone
A naturally magnetized variety of magnetite that attracts iron, historically used as the first magnetic compass.
mineral
Magnetite
A naturally magnetic black iron oxide and a major iron ore; strongly magnetic specimens are known as lodestone.
mineral
Tantalite
A dense black iron-manganese tantalate that is the chief ore of tantalum, forming a series with columbite and mined as coltan.
mineral
Ilmenite
Ilmenite is the world's leading source of titanium, a heavy iron-black oxide common in mafic rocks and black sands.
mineral
Chalcopyrite
A brassy copper-iron sulfide that is the world's most important copper ore, often showing colorful iridescent tarnish.
mineral
Hematite
The principal iron ore, a heavy iron oxide ranging from metallic silver-gray to earthy red, always leaving a tell-tale red-brown streak.
mineral
Wolframite
Wolframite is the historic principal ore of tungsten, a heavy black tungstate forming bladed crystals in granite veins.
mineral
Limonite
Limonite is an amorphous brown iron oxide ore, the rust-colored material behind ochre pigments and bog iron.
mineral
Bornite
A copper iron sulfide famous for its vivid iridescent purple-blue tarnish, the classic peacock ore and a copper ore.
mineral
Goethite
Goethite is a common brown iron oxyhydroxide, the main crystalline component of limonite and rust, with shimmering botryoidal forms.
mineral
Yowah Nut Opal
Small ironstone concretions from Yowah, Queensland, whose hollow or veined centers hold brilliant precious boulder opal.
gemstone
Yellow Beryl
The yellow variety of beryl, also called heliodor or golden beryl, colored by iron and valued for its bright color and durability.
gemstone
Green Beryl
Light green beryl colored mainly by iron, distinguished from emerald, which owes its deeper green to chromium or vanadium.
gemstone