Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ rocks, minerals, crystals, and gemstones — with properties, formation, colors, hardness, and how to tell them apart.
Pyrite
The brassy iron sulfide mineral famous as 'fool's gold,' known for sharp metallic cubes and a much higher hardness than real gold.
mineral
Matrix Opal
Opal in which precious play-of-color is intimately dispersed through the pores of its host rock rather than forming a solid seam.
gemstone
Emerald in Matrix
Natural emerald crystals still embedded in their host rock, prized as mineral specimens that show how the gem grew in place.
gemstone
Aquamarine Matrix
Aquamarine crystals still attached to their natural host rock, prized as mineral specimens showing beryl in its original pocket setting.
mineral
Basalt
A fine-grained, dark volcanic rock that erupts as fluid lava and forms most of the ocean floor and many lava plateaus.
igneous
Scoria
A dark, highly vesicular volcanic rock full of gas bubbles, denser than pumice, common as red or black lava rock.
igneous
Millerite
A nickel sulfide famous for delicate brass-yellow hairlike crystals that form radiating sprays inside cavities and geodes.
mineral
Pyrrhotite
A bronze-colored iron sulfide notable for being the most magnetic of the common sulfide minerals and an important nickel host.
mineral
Arsenopyrite
A silver-white iron arsenic sulfide and the most common arsenic mineral, known for striking sparks and a garlic smell when struck.
mineral
Chalcopyrite
A brassy copper-iron sulfide that is the world's most important copper ore, often showing colorful iridescent tarnish.
mineral
Wacke
A poorly sorted, muddy sandstone with abundant clay matrix between its grains, typically dark and deposited by turbidity currents.
sedimentary
Koroit Opal
Boulder opal from the Koroit field in Queensland, famous for intricate ironstone matrix patterns laced with colorful precious opal.
gemstoneSpiderweb Jasper
A jasper crossed by fine dark veins forming a spiderweb-like network, often a brecciated stone cemented by darker matrix.
mineral
Boulder Opal
Precious opal that forms in thin veins within brown ironstone boulders, cut with the host rock left as a natural dark backing.
gemstone
Peacock Ore
A copper-iron sulfide ore famous for its iridescent peacock-like purple and blue tarnish; often sold as treated chalcopyrite.
mineral
Honduran Opal
Precious opal from Honduras occurring in a dark volcanic matrix, where bright flecks of color flash against a natural black basalt background.
gemstone
Andamooka Opal
Precious opal from the Andamooka field of South Australia, famous for solid crystal opal and its distinctive treatable matrix opal.
gemstone
Tiger Iron
A banded combination rock of golden tiger's eye, red jasper, and metallic hematite, formed in ancient iron deposits.
metamorphic
Emerald Crystal
The natural crystalline form of emerald, the prized green chromium-and-vanadium variety of beryl and the May birthstone.
crystal
Banded Iron Formation
Ancient chemically deposited rock of alternating iron-oxide and silica bands recording Earth's early oxygenation and a major iron ore source.
sedimentary
Black Shale
Dark, organic-rich fine-grained sedimentary rock formed in oxygen-poor waters, often a source rock for oil and gas.
sedimentary
Lapis Lazuli
An intensely blue metamorphic rock of lazurite flecked with golden pyrite, prized for millennia as a gemstone and ultramarine pigment.
metamorphicSonoran Sunset Jasper
A vivid copper-bearing Mexican stone of red cuprite and green chrysocolla that evokes a desert sunset.
mineral
Pumice
A frothy, lightweight volcanic glass so full of gas bubbles that it can float on water.
igneous