---
title: Lined Butterflyfish (Chaetodon lineolatus)
scientific_name: Chaetodon lineolatus
common_name: Lined Butterflyfish
taxon: Butterflyfishes
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2023-12-22T22:36:08.052Z
updated: 2026-08-28T23:58:20.654Z
tags: Lined Butterflyfish, Chaetodon lineolatus, Butterflyfishes, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/butterflyfishes/lined-butterflyfish
---

# Lined Butterflyfish (*Chaetodon lineolatus*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Butterflyfishes (*Chaetodontidae*)
- **Size:** up to 30 cm
- **Depth:** 2-50 m
- **Max age:** 10 yrs
- **Diet:** Omnivore
- **Activity:** Diurnal
- **Rarity:** Uncommon
- **Habitat:** coral-rich reef slopes and lagoons
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Gonochoric
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- white body crossed by dozens of fine vertical black lines
- broad black wedge along the rear of the back, running onto the tail base
- bright yellow dorsal, anal and tail fins
- black bar dropping through the eye
- up to 30 cm, the largest butterflyfish there is

At 30 cm this is the largest butterflyfish in the world, and on the reef it looks it: a fish the size of a dinner plate cruising over coral heads where the rest of the family are the size of a hand.

It is white, crossed by dozens of fine vertical black lines, with a broad black wedge along the rear of the back that runs down onto the tail base. The dorsal, anal and tail fins are yellow, and a black bar drops straight through the eye. Nothing else in this sea puts that pattern on that much fish, and the black wedge is the mark that survives a bad photograph in poor visibility.

The bar through the eye is working camouflage. A predator aims at the eye because the eye tells it which way the prey will turn, so butterflyfishes hide the real eye inside a dark stripe and, in many species, hang a false spot or a false rear end at the other end of the body. The deep, disc-shaped body then pivots almost on the spot, and the guess costs the attacker its strike.

Lined butterflyfish live in pairs, and the pair is not a breeding-season arrangement. Partners in this family stay together for years, feed within sight of each other and take turns keeping watch. When researchers broke up long-standing pairs and forced new ones, the new partners spent their time in conflict and both fed worse, and the penalty faded only after the new bond had had months to settle.

It eats coral polyps, but not only coral polyps. Anemones, small invertebrates and algae all go down, and that flexibility is the difference between this fish and the strict coral feeders beside it on the same slope: when a reef bleaches, the specialists starve and this one keeps eating. Look for it between 2 and 50 m, usually two at a time. Recorded ages reach ten years.

## Also known as

- **English:** lined butterflyfish, Line Butterflyfish, Lined Butterfly
- **Hebrew:** פרפרון שחור-אוכף
- **French:** Papillon à lignes, Poisson-papillon à lignes, Chaetodon strié
- **Italian:** Pesce farfalla lineato
- **German:** Riesen-Falterfisch
- **Spanish:** Pez mariposa rayado
- **Portuguese:** Peixe-borboleta-de-linhas-finas
- **Dutch:** Witte Koraalvlinder
- **Polish:** Ustnik smuzkowy
- **Czech:** klipka velká
- **Japanese:** ニセフウライチョウチョウウオ, Nise-furai-chô-chô-uo, Nisefuraichochouo
- **Chinese:** 新月蝶, 紋身蝴蝶魚, 細紋蝴蝶魚
- **Russian:** Линейная рыба-бабочка
- **CA:** Peix papallona lluna
- **DA:** Linjet fanefisk
- **FIJ:** tivitivi
- **KO:** 줄나비고기
- **TAH:** paraharaha
- **TH:** ปลาผีเสื้อลายตรง

## Scientific synonyms

- *Anisochaetodon lineolatus* (Cuvier, 1831)
- *Chaetodon lieneolatus* Cuvier, 1831
- *Chaetodon lunatus* Cuvier, 1831
- *Chaetodon tallii* Bleeker, 1854
- *Tetragonoptrus lineolatus* (Cuvier, 1831)

## Range

Indian Ocean, Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, Red Sea, Republic of Mauritius, Seychelles, South Africa

---

*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/butterflyfishes/lined-butterflyfish)*
*Updated: August 28, 2026*