Snake Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ snakes from around the world — with venomous status, family, range, size, habitat, and how to tell look-alikes apart.
Common Glossy Racer
A widespread, smooth-scaled racer with a glossy sheen, found across a broad swath of Neotropical habitats.
Persian Horned Viper
A desert viper of the Middle East with prominent hornlike scales above the eyes, occupying rocky and sandy terrain.
Rough Earthsnake
A tiny, drab, keeled-scaled snake commonly hidden beneath leaf litter and garden debris across the Southeast.
False Horned Viper
A desert viper of the Middle East that mimics true horned vipers with supraocular scale projections, but belongs to a distinct genus.
Sunbeam Snake
A glossy, iridescent burrowing snake of Southeast Asia named for the rainbow sheen its smooth scales produce in sunlight.
Yellow-tailed Cribo
A large, powerful South American colubrid related to indigo snakes, known for its glossy scales and impressive length.
Silver Boa
An extremely rare, silvery-scaled boa described only in 2016, found solely on a single tiny island in the Bahamas.
Smooth Earth Snake
A small, plain, burrowing colubrid of the eastern and central United States, closely resembling the Rough Earth Snake but with smooth scales.
Speckled Shield Cobra
A dangerously venomous cobra of Central Asian deserts and semi-arid regions, distinguished by its plain, faintly speckled scales.
Southeastern Green Snake
A slender, bright green North American snake with keeled scales, well known as a gentle, harmless resident of shrubs and vines.
Brazilian Rainbow Boa
A vividly patterned constrictor famous for the iridescent sheen of its scales, which produces a rainbow-like shimmer in direct sunlight.
Anomalous Sea Snake
A sea snake named for its unusual combination of scale and morphological traits, found in coastal waters of the northern Indian Ocean.
Smooth Earthsnake
A small, plain-colored, smooth-scaled snake found under forest debris across a broad swath of the eastern U.S.
Lataste's Viper
A small viper of the Iberian Peninsula and northwestern Africa, recognized by a small upturned snout scale.
Java File Snake
A fully aquatic file snake covered in rough, granular scales, found in the rivers and estuaries of Java and the surrounding Southeast Asian region.
Diamond Python
A cool-climate subspecies of carpet python from southeastern Australia, marked with diamond-shaped clusters of pale scales on a black background.
Elephant Trunk Snake
A wholly aquatic snake with loose, baggy, wrinkled skin covered in tiny rough scales, giving it a texture reminiscent of an elephant's trunk.
Horned Adder
A small desert adder with a prominent single horn-like scale above each eye, well camouflaged against sandy soils.
Desert Horned Viper
An iconic desert viper of the Sahara and Arabian Peninsula, easily recognized by the small hornlike scales often present above its eyes.
Black File Snake
A small, dark, heavily keeled fossorial snake from East Asian forests, named for the rasp-like texture of its scales.
Speckled Brown Snake
A medium-sized brown snake species from the interior of Queensland, named for the fine speckled pattern often present on its scales.
Nitsche's Bush Viper
An arboreal African viper of montane forest habitats, named for its variable coloring and keeled scales.
Cape File Snake
A distinctive African colubrid with unusually rough, file-like body scales and a specialized diet that includes other snakes, notably venomous species.
Peters's Sea Snake
A distinctive sea snake with raised, spine-like scales on its head, found in shallow coastal waters of northern Australia and Southeast Asia.