Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia

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

Golden Emerald

A trade name occasionally used for golden-yellow beryl (golden beryl or heliodor), the iron-colored yellow variety of the emerald mineral.

A fine-grained, feldspar-rich dike rock with a trachytic texture, essentially a hypabyssal equivalent of trachyte or syenite.

The potassium-rich feldspar group - orthoclase, microcline, and sanidine - a major rock-forming mineral often recognized by its salmon-pink color.

A dark hornblende-rich lamprophyre dike rock with amphibole and augite phenocrysts in an alkali-feldspar-dominated groundmass.

Green-tinted volcanic glass; some is naturally colored by trace iron, but vivid emerald-green pieces are usually manufactured glass.

A warm mustard to brownish-yellow tourmaline, colored by iron or manganese, sitting between yellow and brown dravite tones.

An Australian green rhyolite with eye-like orbs and earthy patterns marketed as jasper, evoking dense rainforest foliage.

Obsidian colored brown by iron oxide inclusions, frequently banded or swirled with black as in mahogany obsidian.

A rich brown variety of andradite (or grossular-andradite) garnet, marketed for its warm chocolate color and notable brilliance.

A richly saturated green variety of elbaite tourmaline whose color rivals emerald, colored by trace iron, chromium, or vanadium.

A glacier-transported banded agate from the Lake Superior region, colored by iron into rich reds and oranges, and Minnesota's state gemstone.