Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia

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

Super Seven

A trade name for quartz containing a combination of seven minerals including amethyst, smoky quartz, and cacoxenite, prized by collectors.

An opaque, often colorfully patterned variety of chalcedony quartz, popular for tumbling, carving, and jewelry.

A rich green, fuchsite-rich metamorphic rock from southern Africa, prized as a carving and ornamental stone.

An altered granite of pink feldspar, green epidote and quartz, mottled pink-and-green and popular as a tumbled and carving stone.

An opaque green variety of chalcedony quartz colored by iron and chlorite-group inclusions, prized as a durable carving and cabochon stone.

A warm golden-to-amber variety of calcite, a soft calcium carbonate mineral valued for its honeyed glow and easy carving.

A water-bearing massive grossular garnet, usually green or pink, widely used as a tough jade-like carving stone.

One of the two jade minerals, an amphibole prized for its extreme toughness and soft, waxy green hues used in carving for millennia.

A deep black variety of banded chalcedony, often closely related to or treated like onyx, used for jewelry and carvings.

A bold black-and-white banded chalcedony named for its orca-like coloring, popular as carvings and statement jewelry.

The soft pink, usually cloudy variety of quartz colored by trace titanium or microscopic inclusions, popular for carvings and beads.

Translucent banded calcium-carbonate stone deposited in caves and springs, prized for ornamental carvings despite its softness.

A dull, resinous volcanic glass similar to obsidian but with higher water content and a waxy pitch-like luster.

The titanium-rich black variety of andradite garnet, with a brilliant resinous luster prized for mourning and statement jewelry.