Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ rocks, minerals, crystals, and gemstones — with properties, formation, colors, hardness, and how to tell them apart.
Larimar
A rare sky-blue variety of pectolite found only in the Dominican Republic, prized for its sea-like color and white volcanic patterning.
gemstoneCarrara Marble
A famous white to blue-grey Italian marble from Carrara, prized for centuries by sculptors and architects for its purity and fine grain.
metamorphicWhiteschist
A rare high-pressure metamorphic schist defined by the diagnostic assemblage of talc plus kyanite, often pale and silvery.
metamorphic
Moonstone
A feldspar gem famous for adularescence, a floating blue-white glow that shimmers across the stone like moonlight.
gemstone
Amazonite
The blue-green gem variety of microcline feldspar, often mottled with white, prized as an affordable ornamental stone.
mineralLeuco Garnet
The rare colorless variety of grossular garnet, a near-flawless transparent gem free of the iron and chromium that color most garnets.
gemstone
Snow Quartz
An opaque, snow-white variety of quartz whose milky color comes from countless tiny gas and fluid inclusions.
crystal
Onyx
A banded variety of chalcedony quartz, classically black or black-and-white, long favored for cameos and beads.
gemstone
Perlite
A hydrated volcanic glass with pearly, onion-like concentric cracks that pops into lightweight white granules when heated.
igneous
Scheelite
Scheelite is a calcium tungstate ore of tungsten, famous for its brilliant blue-white fluorescence under ultraviolet light.
mineralMilk Opal
An opaque to translucent milky-white common opal valued for its soft porcelain-like color rather than play-of-color.
gemstone
Rhodochrosite
Rhodochrosite is a rose-pink manganese carbonate prized for raspberry-red crystals and banded pink-and-white gem material.
gemstone
Botswana Agate
A finely banded agate from Botswana known for delicate parallel layers of grey, pink, and white.
mineral
Skutterudite
A metallic cobalt-nickel arsenide, an important cobalt ore, named for the Skutterud mines of Norway.
mineral
Black Moonstone
A dark gray-to-black feldspar variety of moonstone that shows blue and white adularescent flash against a smoky body.
gemstone
Goshenite
The colorless variety of beryl, named after Goshen, Massachusetts, prized for its purity, clarity, and durability.
gemstone
Clear Beryl
Transparent, colorless beryl (goshenite), the pure form of the species valued for its clarity, hardness, and well-formed crystals.
gemstone
Sylvanite
A silver-white gold-silver telluride and important gold-silver ore, noted for crystals arranged in writing-like graphic patterns.
mineral
Milky Quartz
The most common variety of quartz, milky white from microscopic fluid and gas inclusions, forming massive veins worldwide.
crystal
Chalcedony
A waxy, translucent microcrystalline form of quartz that serves as the parent group for agate, jasper, carnelian, and onyx.
mineral
Topaz
A hard, brilliant fluorosilicate gemstone occurring in many colors, from precious golden imperial topaz to popular blue topaz.
gemstone
Chalk
A soft, white, fine-grained limestone made almost entirely of microscopic marine plankton skeletons.
sedimentary
Albite
The sodium end-member of the plagioclase feldspar series, a common white rock-forming mineral and parent of peristerite moonstone.
mineralPentelic Marble
The fine white marble of Mount Pentelikon used to build the Parthenon, famous for the golden patina it develops with age.
metamorphic