The world's heaviest bony fish weighs in at 2744 kilograms.

A southern sunfish (Mola Alexandrini) discovered dead off the coast of Faial Island in the Azores has broken the world record for the heaviest bony fish, though boneless fish weigh more.

The world's largest sunfish  AtlanticNaturalist.org
The world's largest sunfish  AtlanticNaturalist.org

The world's heaviest bony fish, a dead southern sunfish (Mola alexandrini) discovered near the Azores in the Atlantic, weighed in at 2744 kilograms.


While there are heavier fish without bones, such as the cartilage-filled whale shark (Rhincodon typus), which can weigh more than 20 tonnes, the previous record holder for the world's heaviest bony fish was also a southern sunfish, which weighed 2300 kilograms and was 272-centimetres long and was discovered in Kamogawa, Japan, in 1996.

José Nuno Gomes-Pereira of the Atlantic Naturalist Association in Portugal and his colleagues discovered a large, dead sunfish floating off the coast of Faial Island in December 2021. Gomes-Pereira and his team were able to drag the carcass to shore in order to weigh, measure, and collect DNA from the fish.


They weighed it with a crane at 2744 kilograms, more than 400 kilograms heavier than the previous heaviest, and 325 cm in length.


While they don't know what killed the fish, they discovered a large semi-cylindrical depression near its head marked with red paint, similar to what's seen on a boat's keel. However, it is unclear whether this mark occurred before or after the fish died.

Journal reference: Journal of Fish Biology, DOI: 10.1111/jfb.15244

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