Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ rocks, minerals, crystals, and gemstones — with properties, formation, colors, hardness, and how to tell them apart.
Green Agate
A green-hued banded chalcedony, ranging from natural soft greens to brightly dyed commercial stones.
gemstoneSonoran Sunset Jasper
A vivid copper-bearing Mexican stone of red cuprite and green chrysocolla that evokes a desert sunset.
mineralSunset Agate
A warmly colored chalcedony agate with reds, oranges, golds, and pinks that blend like the glowing bands of a sunset sky.
gemstoneDouble Flow Obsidian
Obsidian formed from two merged lava flows, producing a stone with two distinct bands of sheen or color.
igneous
Raspberry Garnet
A vivid pinkish-red rhodolite garnet named for its raspberry color, a bright pyrope-almandine blend popular in jewelry.
gemstoneGrape Garnet
A trademarked deep purple-red rhodolite garnet from India, named for its rich grape-like color from the pyrope-almandine series.
gemstone
Red Garnet
The classic deep-red garnet — usually almandine or pyrope — long worn as the fiery 'carbuncle' gem and January's birthstone.
gemstone
Strawberry Garnet
A bright strawberry-red garnet, typically an almandine-pyrope blend prized for its juicy, lively red color in jewelry.
gemstone
Microcline
A common potassium feldspar identical in composition to orthoclase but more ordered, famous for its green gem variety amazonite.
mineral
Goldstone
A man-made glittering glass packed with tiny copper crystals, traditionally reddish-brown but also made in blue and green.
crystal
Andalusite
A pleochroic aluminum silicate that flashes green and reddish-brown from different angles, with a cross-marked variety called chiastolite.
mineral
Rutilated Quartz
Clear or smoky quartz threaded with golden to reddish needles of rutile, also poetically called Venus hair stone.
crystalRiband Agate
A banded chalcedony with straight, ribbon-like parallel layers, often cut across the bands for striking striped cabochons.
gemstoneFireworks Obsidian
Black volcanic glass dotted with radiating spherulite bursts that look like exploding fireworks frozen in the stone.
igneous
Moonstone
A feldspar gem famous for adularescence, a floating blue-white glow that shimmers across the stone like moonlight.
gemstone
Leopard Opal
A patterned common opal with mottled, leopard-like spots and blotches, prized as an ornamental and cabochon stone.
gemstone
Purple Tourmaline
An uncommon purple to violet tourmaline colored by manganese, the deeper reddish-purple stones sometimes called siberite.
gemstone
Orbicular Granite
A rare granitic rock containing concentric, onion-like spheres called orbicules, prized as a striking ornamental stone.
igneousLemurian Seed Quartz
Clear quartz crystals marked by distinctive horizontal ladder-like striations, popularized from Brazil as a metaphysical stone.
crystal
Leopard Skin Jasper
A spotted jasper-rhyolite patterned with leopard-like rings and ovals, valued as an earthy ornamental and lapidary stone.
sedimentary
Cat's Eye Beryl
Beryl displaying chatoyancy, a bright moving band of light, caused by parallel tube-like inclusions when cut as a cabochon.
gemstone
Flower Agate
A creamy pink-and-white chalcedony from Madagascar containing flower-like plume inclusions that resemble blossoms suspended in stone.
gemstoneSpiderweb Jasper
A jasper crossed by fine dark veins forming a spiderweb-like network, often a brecciated stone cemented by darker matrix.
mineral
Landscape Opal
A common opal containing dendritic or mossy mineral inclusions that form miniature landscape-like scenes inside the stone.
gemstone