Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia

Search and identify 1,000+ rocks, minerals, crystals, and gemstones — with properties, formation, colors, hardness, and how to tell them apart.

Graphite Schist

A dark, foliated schist rich in graphite that leaves a grey-black mark and forms from metamorphosed carbon-rich sediments.

A classic Oregon picture jasper showing layered tan, brown, and blue-grey scenes resembling desert landscapes and canyons.

Pink beryl (morganite) that shows chatoyancy, a moving band of light, when cut as a cabochon, thanks to parallel tube inclusions.

An opaque grey-brown common opal forming nodules and concretions, historically called liver opal for its dull brownish color.

A black volcanic glass threaded with delicate grey, swirling lace-like bands of flow lines that show beautifully when polished.

A heavy, lead-grey metallic mineral with perfect cubic cleavage, galena is the world's main ore of lead and often carries silver.

Beryl displaying chatoyancy, a bright moving band of light, caused by parallel tube-like inclusions when cut as a cabochon.

A rare greenish-black vanadium sulfide that was historically one of the world's most important ores of vanadium.

A manganese-dominant tourmaline, the source of bright yellow to greenish-yellow gem tourmaline, named for its Madagascar type locality.

A rare garnet that dramatically shifts color from greenish in daylight to reddish under lamplight, rivaling alexandrite.

A spectacularly banded agpaitic nepheline syenite of alternating red eudialyte, black amphibole and white feldspar layers from Ilimaussaq, Greenland.