Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ rocks, minerals, crystals, and gemstones — with properties, formation, colors, hardness, and how to tell them apart.
Norite
A coarse-grained mafic plutonic rock similar to gabbro but with orthopyroxene as the dominant pyroxene instead of clinopyroxene.
igneous
Fire Opal
A translucent to transparent opal in warm yellow, orange, and red tones, prized for body color rather than play-of-color.
gemstone
Yowah Nut Opal
Small ironstone concretions from Yowah, Queensland, whose hollow or veined centers hold brilliant precious boulder opal.
gemstone
Millerite
A nickel sulfide famous for delicate brass-yellow hairlike crystals that form radiating sprays inside cavities and geodes.
mineral
Pyroxenite
A dense, dark ultramafic plutonic rock composed almost entirely of pyroxene minerals, often associated with peridotite and layered intrusions.
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
Mexican Fire Opal
A transparent to translucent opal prized for its glowing orange-to-red body color, mined chiefly in the volcanic highlands of Mexico.
gemstone
Spessartite Garnet
A manganese aluminum garnet glowing in vivid orange to reddish-orange tones, with the finest called mandarin garnet.
gemstone
Azurite
A deep blue copper carbonate mineral that forms in oxidized copper deposits, often alongside green malachite.
mineral
Bog Iron
A soft, porous iron ore of limonite and goethite that forms in wetlands and bogs, historically the first iron source for many cultures.
sedimentary
Pyrargyrite
A silver antimony sulfosalt known as dark ruby silver, an important silver ore with deep red internal reflections.
mineral
Sapropel
A soft, dark, organic-rich mud deposited in stagnant, oxygen-poor water, a key precursor to oil and gas source rocks.
sedimentary
Kimberlite
A rare ultramafic volcanic rock that erupts from deep in the mantle and is the primary natural source of diamonds.
igneous
Bronzite
An iron-rich orthopyroxene prized for its warm bronze schiller, a metallic-looking sheen created by tiny mineral inclusions.
mineral
Sylvanite
A silver-white gold-silver telluride and important gold-silver ore, noted for crystals arranged in writing-like graphic patterns.
mineral
Tangerine Tourmaline
A vivid tangerine-orange elbaite tourmaline colored by manganese, offering a bright, citrusy hue that is uncommon in tourmaline.
gemstone
Skarn
A calc-silicate rock formed by chemical exchange between magma and carbonate rock, often rich in garnet and economically important ore minerals.
metamorphic
Chrome Spessartine
Chrome Spessartine is a rare chromium-bearing manganese garnet whose trace chromium intensifies its already vivid orange color.
gemstone
Feldspar
The most abundant mineral group in Earth's crust, feldspars are aluminosilicates that form much of granite and many igneous rocks.
mineral
Minette
A dark, mica-rich lamprophyre dike rock in which biotite and augite phenocrysts sit in a groundmass dominated by alkali feldspar.
igneous
Websterite
A variety of pyroxenite composed of both orthopyroxene and clinopyroxene with little olivine, found in layered intrusions and the mantle.
igneous
Lamproite
A rare ultrapotassic, magnesium-rich volcanic rock from deep in the mantle, famous as the diamond host at Argyle in Australia.
igneous
Malaia Garnet
A pyrope-spessartine garnet in warm peach, salmon, and pinkish-orange tones, originally rejected by dealers and named 'malaia,' Swahili for outcast.
gemstone
Honey Garnet
A warm golden-brown garnet named for its honey color, typically a hessonite grossular variety with a distinctive treacly internal texture.
gemstone