The classification of fishes
Like all living things, fishes have a place on the Tree of Life. Although they are thought to have descended from a common ancestor, there is still much research in determing the exact relationship between all of the fishes. Although many of the relationships are consistent, there are key differences between classifications shown in different publications. Our tree is based on the classification descrribed by Nelson, J. S. in his book Fishes of the World, 2006. This is the same classification used by the Marine Vertebrate Collection at Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the Digital Fish Library Project at UCSD.

Only taxa related to fish are clickable on this tree, beginning with Craniata.

Rollover a taxa and click on the image box on the lower right to get a summary of the taxa.

Click on a taxa to access the categories underneath.