Rock Identifier

Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia

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

Autumn Jasper

Autumn Jasper

A warm-toned jasper named for its autumn-leaf palette of browns, rust, gold, and cream, popular as soothing earth-tone beads.

mineral
Sunset Agate

Sunset Agate

A warmly colored chalcedony agate with reds, oranges, golds, and pinks that blend like the glowing bands of a sunset sky.

gemstone
Mexican Lace Agate

Mexican Lace Agate

A vividly swirling banded agate from northern Mexico with intricate looping patterns in warm reds, golds and creams.

gemstone
Lamprophyre

Lamprophyre

A dark, mineral-rich dike rock with abundant mica or amphibole phenocrysts set in a fine groundmass, often associated with gold and diamonds.

igneous
Polychrome Jasper

Polychrome Jasper

A warm earth-toned jasper from Madagascar in flowing reds, oranges and golds, also called desert jasper, discovered in the early 2000s.

gemstone
Bohemian Garnet

Bohemian Garnet

Small, intensely red chrome-pyrope garnets from the Czech Bohemian region, famous for densely set antique Victorian jewelry.

gemstone
Arizona Ruby

Arizona Ruby

Arizona Ruby is a chromium-rich pyrope garnet from Arizona, often gathered from anthills, valued for its intense ruby-like red.

gemstone
Ant Hill Garnet

Ant Hill Garnet

Small, bright chrome-pyrope garnets famously brought to the surface by harvester ants on the Navajo lands of Arizona.

gemstone
Cape Ruby

Cape Ruby

Cape Ruby is a deep red pyrope garnet from South African diamond deposits, prized as an affordable, fiery alternative to ruby.

gemstone
Knorringite

Knorringite

A chromium-rich magnesium garnet of the pyrope series that crystallizes in the deep mantle and is a valuable diamond indicator mineral.

mineral
Mozambique Garnet

Mozambique Garnet

An abundant, brightly colored pyrope-almandine garnet from East Africa, valued for its clean, raspberry-to-red gems at accessible prices.

gemstone
Dragon Garnet

Dragon Garnet

A trade name for deep wine-red garnet, typically a rich pyrope-almandine stone marketed for its dramatic, fiery color.

gemstone
Yellow Opal

Yellow Opal

A cheerful yellow opal ranging from translucent common opal to golden fire opal, colored by trace iron in the silica.

gemstone
Garnet

Garnet

A group of silicate gemstones best known for deep red but spanning nearly every color, including green tsavorite and orange spessartine.

gemstone
Pyralspite Garnet

Pyralspite Garnet

Pyralspite is the aluminum garnet series uniting pyrope, almandine, and spessartine, covering most red, orange, and purple gem garnets.

mineral
Mahenge Garnet

Mahenge Garnet

Mahenge Garnet is a pyrope-spessartine gem from Tanzania's Mahenge region, prized for vivid pink, purple, and color-change tones.

gemstone
Ametrine

Ametrine

A natural bicolor quartz that combines purple amethyst and golden citrine in a single crystal.

crystal
Orange Tourmaline

Orange Tourmaline

A warm orange to tangerine tourmaline, an uncommon hue produced by manganese and iron in the crystal.

gemstone
Green Jade

Green Jade

The classic green ornamental gem, either jadeite or nephrite, valued for millennia for its toughness and rich color, especially imperial green.

gemstone
Honey Garnet

Honey Garnet

A warm golden-brown garnet named for its honey color, typically a hessonite grossular variety with a distinctive treacly internal texture.

gemstone
Rhodolite Garnet

Rhodolite Garnet

A purplish-red to raspberry garnet that is a natural blend of pyrope and almandine, prized for its bright rose-violet color.

gemstone
Aquamarine

Aquamarine

The serene blue-to-sea-green variety of beryl, aquamarine is a durable gemstone colored by trace iron and birthstone for March.

gemstone
Rutilated Quartz

Rutilated Quartz

Clear or smoky quartz threaded with golden to reddish needles of rutile, also poetically called Venus hair stone.

crystal
Pink Garnet

Pink Garnet

A trade name for pink garnets, mainly rhodolite, a rose-to-purplish pyrope-almandine blend prized for its bright clean color.

gemstone