Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ rocks, minerals, crystals, and gemstones — with properties, formation, colors, hardness, and how to tell them apart.
Phantom Quartz
Quartz containing visible internal crystal outlines, formed when growth paused and trapped a layer of mineral inclusions.
crystal
Clear Quartz
The pure, colorless form of crystalline quartz, valued for its clarity, abundance, and piezoelectric properties used in electronics.
crystal
Blue Quartz
A naturally blue quartz colored by tiny mineral inclusions such as dumortierite or scattered rutile and tourmaline fibers.
crystal
Green Quartz
A green variety of macrocrystalline quartz, usually the heat- or radiation-altered prasiolite, prized for its soft mint hue.
crystal
Elestial Quartz
A quartz with a complex skeletal, layered surface of many terminations and etched recesses, also called skeletal or jacare quartz.
crystal
Cathedral Quartz
Quartz with a stepped, multi-pointed structure of parallel side crystals resembling the spires of a cathedral.
crystal
Rose Tourmaline
A soft to medium pink elbaite tourmaline in rose hues, colored by manganese and prized for romantic jewelry.
gemstoneLemurian Seed Quartz
Clear quartz crystals marked by distinctive horizontal ladder-like striations, popularized from Brazil as a metaphysical stone.
crystal
Golden Healer Quartz
Quartz colored or coated by golden iron oxides such as limonite or goethite, giving a warm sunlit yellow glow.
crystal
Quartz-mica Schist
A foliated metamorphic rock of interlayered quartz and mica, producing a sparkling, easily split rock from metamorphosed sandy shales.
metamorphic
Chalcedony
A waxy, translucent microcrystalline form of quartz that serves as the parent group for agate, jasper, carnelian, and onyx.
mineral
Pink Agate
A soft pink banded chalcedony, occurring naturally in delicate hues and also commonly produced by dyeing.
gemstone
Desert Rose
A rosette-shaped cluster of bladed gypsum or barite crystals that traps sand, forming flower-like formations in arid deserts.
mineralRegency Rose Agate
A prized plume agate with rose-pink and red feathery inclusions suspended in clear chalcedony, from the western U.S.
gemstone
Pink Emerald
A trade name sometimes used for pink beryl (morganite), the manganese-colored rose-to-peach variety of the emerald mineral.
gemstonePink Obsidian
A pink to rose volcanic glass; some is natural iron-tinted obsidian while much sold commercially is color-treated glass.
igneousPink Lady Obsidian
Obsidian showing a pink-to-rose sheen or hue; natural examples get color from interference effects, while uniform pink material is often manufactured glass.
igneous
Pink Beryl
The pink to peach variety of beryl, better known as morganite, colored by manganese and prized for its gentle pastel hues.
gemstone
Pink Tourmaline
A pink to red gem variety of elbaite tourmaline, colored by manganese, ranging from soft pastel pink to vivid rubellite red.
gemstone
Pink Garnet
A trade name for pink garnets, mainly rhodolite, a rose-to-purplish pyrope-almandine blend prized for its bright clean color.
gemstonePink Opal
A soft pink common opal, most famously from Peru, valued for its gentle pastel color rather than play-of-color.
gemstone
Blue Chalcedony
A translucent, soft blue variety of microcrystalline quartz whose color comes from light scattering through its fine structure.
mineral
Purple-Pink Tourmaline
Elbaite tourmaline in purplish-pink to magenta hues, colored by manganese, prized for its vivid orchid-like tones.
gemstonePrase
An old name for a dull leek-green variety of quartz or chalcedony colored by green mineral inclusions, historically called mother of emerald.
crystal