---
title: Arabian Angelfish (Pomacanthus asfur)
scientific_name: Pomacanthus asfur
common_name: Arabian Angelfish
taxon: Angelfishes
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2024-10-28T09:49:17.803Z
updated: 2026-08-13T21:24:54.703Z
tags: Arabian Angelfish, Pomacanthus asfur, Angelfishes, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/angelfishes/arabian-angelfish
---

# Arabian Angelfish (*Pomacanthus asfur*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Angelfishes (*Pomacanthidae*)
- **Size:** up to 40 cm
- **Depth:** 3-30 m
- **Diet:** Omnivore
- **Activity:** Diurnal
- **Rarity:** Uncommon
- **Habitat:** Coral-rich reef with caves, often in silty inshore areas
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Protogynous hermaphrodite
- **Endemic:** Endemic to the Red Sea
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- dark blue body crossed by one broad bright yellow bar
- yellow tail, blue-edged fins
- juveniles black with fine blue and white bars
- length up to 40 cm

Deep blue with a single broad yellow bar across the middle and a yellow tail - one of the two large angelfish that belong to this sea, and one of the most photographed fish on any Red Sea reef.

Its range is the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, and that is all. A fish this conspicuous, this popular in the aquarium trade and this narrowly distributed is exactly the kind that a catalogue should flag: there is no reserve population elsewhere to draw on.

It shares the reef with the Yellowbar Angelfish, and the two are told apart at a glance once you know - the bar here is broad and vertical, on the yellowbar it is a curved crescent tapering to the belly.

It eats sponges and tunicates, works cave mouths and overhangs, and holds a territory in pairs. Juveniles are a different animal: black with fine blue and white bars, hidden in shallow rubble, and cleaning parasites off larger fish while they grow.

## Also known as

- **English:** Arabian angelfish
- **French:** Poisson-ange demi-lune
- **Italian:** Pesce angelo semilunare
- **German:** Halbmond-Kaiserfisch
- **Spanish:** Pez ángel árabe
- **Portuguese:** Peixe-anjo-árabe
- **Dutch:** Blauwe Bruid van de Zee
- **Czech:** pomec půlměsíčitý
- **Russian:** Арабский ангел
- **CA:** Peix àngel àrab
- **DA:** Arabisk Kejserfisk

## Scientific synonyms

- *Arusetta asfur* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Chaetodon asfur* Forsskål, 1775

## Range

Djibouti, Eritrea, Federal Republic of Somalia, Red Sea, Tanzania

---

*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/angelfishes/arabian-angelfish)*
*Updated: August 13, 2026*