---
title: Starry Goby (Asterropteryx semipunctata)
scientific_name: Asterropteryx semipunctata
common_name: Starry Goby
taxon: Gobies
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2024-11-20T19:02:31.437Z
updated: 2026-08-17T15:46:05.994Z
tags: Starry Goby, Asterropteryx semipunctata, Gobies, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/gobies/starry-goby
---

# Starry Goby (*Asterropteryx semipunctata*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Gobies (*Gobiidae*)
- **Size:** up to 6.5 cm
- **Depth:** 1-20 m
- **Diet:** Carnivore
- **Activity:** Diurnal
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Sheltered bays and turbid inner lagoons, on algae-covered rock and rubble
- **Reproduction:** Egg layer
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- tan to almost black, covered in small bright spots
- row of dark elongated marks along the side and short saddles across the back
- third dorsal spine drawn out into a long filament in adults
- in murky sheltered water where the reef gives way to rubble
- up to 6.5 cm

It takes the ground nothing else wants. Sheltered bays, turbid inner lagoons, algae-covered rubble, the silty inner flats where visibility is poor and the coral is patchy or dead. Those are places a reef fish community thins out to almost nothing, and this goby is one of the few that thickens up there instead.

That makes it useful to notice. A stretch of bottom carrying starry gobies and little else is usually telling you something about the water: too much sediment, too little flow, or a reef that has been through something.

The spots are where the name comes from, small and bright over a dark body, and in adults the third spine of the front dorsal fin is drawn out into a long filament that stands up when the fish displays.

It lives in a hole or under rubble, comes out for small bottom animals, and goes straight back in. Alone usually, sometimes in loose groups where the ground is good.

## Also known as

- **English:** Bluespotted Goby, Halfspotted Goby, Star-finned Goby
- **French:** Gobie à points bleus
- **Japanese:** ホシハゼ, Hoshihaze
- **Chinese:** 半斑星塘鱧, 星塘鱧
- **TAH:** 'o'opu

## Scientific synonyms

- *Asteropteryx semipunctatus* Rüppell, 1830
- *Asterropterix eumeces* Pietschmann, 1934
- *Asterropterix semipunctata* Rüppell, 1830
- *Asterropterix semipunctatus* Rüppell, 1830
- *Asterropterix semipunctatus quisqualis* Whitley, 1932
- *Asterropteryx semipunctatus* Rüppell, 1830
- *Eleotris miniatus* Seale, 1901
- *Gobiomorphus hypselopteryx* Pietschmann, 1934
- *Gobiomorphus robustus* Pietschmann, 1934
- *Priolepis auriga* Ehrenberg, 1871
- *Prioolepis auriga* Ehrenberg, 1871

---

*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/gobies/starry-goby)*
*Updated: August 17, 2026*