Basking shark
Cetorhinus maximus
Size, compared with you
You: 1.7 m. Basking shark: 10 m.
Giant. Grows up to about 10 m.
The second-biggest fish in the sea, after the whale shark. It looks fearsome with its gaping mouth, but it only eats plankton, which it strains out of the water as it glides along.
The weird bit
A basking shark has the smallest brain, compared with its body weight, of any shark.
Quick facts
- Where it lives
- Coast and shallows, Open ocean0 to 910 m down
- What it eats
- Tiny plankton, mostly small crustaceans called copepods, filtered from the water
- How worried are we?
- In danger (Endangered)Assessed in 2018 by the IUCN Red List.