Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia

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

Schist

A medium-grade metamorphic rock rich in aligned platy minerals that gives it a shiny, easily splitting, foliated texture.

A general field term for green, low-grade metamorphosed basaltic rocks colored by chlorite, epidote, and actinolite.

Deeply saturated green tourmaline colored by iron, often so dark it appears nearly black until viewed in bright light.

Molybdenite is the primary ore of molybdenum, a soft, greasy, silver-gray sulfide that closely resembles graphite.

A hydrated volcanic glass with pearly, onion-like concentric cracks that pops into lightweight white granules when heated.

A single beryl crystal showing two distinct color zones, such as aquamarine blue grading into morganite pink, within one stone.

A fine-grained, low-grade metamorphic rock that splits into flat sheets along slaty cleavage, long used for roofing and flooring.

A shiny, foliated schist studded with red garnet crystals that grew during medium-grade regional metamorphism.

A soft, green, foliated rock rich in chlorite, formed by low-grade metamorphism of mafic or volcanic rocks.

A mica schist containing bladed blue kyanite crystals, a marker of medium- to high-grade metamorphism of aluminous rocks.

The deepest, most saturated blue grade of treated topaz, prized for its rich steely-blue color and durability in jewelry.

A foliated metamorphic rock dominated by glittering dark biotite mica, formed from mudstones under medium-grade regional metamorphism.

The blue color variety of beryl, ranging from pale sky tones to rich sea-blue, best known in its finest grades as aquamarine.