Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia

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

Lapis Lazuli

An intensely blue metamorphic rock of lazurite flecked with golden pyrite, prized for millennia as a gemstone and ultramarine pigment.

A metamorphosed limestone of interlocking calcite crystals, prized for sculpture and architecture for its workability and polish.

Translucent banded calcium-carbonate stone deposited in caves and springs, prized for ornamental carvings despite its softness.

A green ornamental stone, often serpentine-rich marble or verde antique, valued for its rich green color and white veining.

A green-and-white banded metamorphic marble whose wavy mica layers resemble the rings of a sliced onion.

A royal-blue feldspathoid mineral with white calcite veining, often confused with lapis lazuli but lacking its golden pyrite flecks.

Aquamarine crystals still attached to their natural host rock, prized as mineral specimens showing beryl in its original pocket setting.

The rare calcium-chromium garnet, famous for its sparkling emerald-green druzy crusts of tiny crystals, the only consistently green garnet.

Tourmaline crystals displaying two or more distinct colors at once, including the famous pink-and-green watermelon variety.

A silver sulfide that is one of the most important silver ore minerals, forming dark metallic crystals and wires.

A dark gray copper sulfide that is one of the richest copper ores, prized by collectors when found as rare sharp crystals.