---
title: Goldstriped Seabream (Rhabdosargus sarba)
scientific_name: Rhabdosargus sarba
common_name: Goldstriped Seabream
taxon: Sea breams
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2024-11-13T16:46:23.082Z
updated: 2026-08-13T12:14:22.462Z
tags: Goldstriped Seabream, Rhabdosargus sarba, Sea breams, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/sea-breams/goldstriped-seabream
---

# Goldstriped Seabream (*Rhabdosargus sarba*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Sea breams (*Sparidae*)
- **Size:** up to 80 cm
- **Weight:** 12 Kg
- **Depth:** 1-60 m
- **Diet:** Durophage
- **Activity:** Diurnal
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Shallow coast, harbors and estuaries, over sand and rock
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Protandrous hermaphrodite
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- silver body with fine gold lines running along the scale rows
- yellow pelvic and anal fins, dark edge to the tail
- small mouth with strong molars behind, often nosing at the bottom
- length up to 80 cm

A silver seabream to 80 cm (31 in) with fine gold lines along the scale rows and yellow lower fins. It works shallow rocky coast, harbors and estuary mouths, which is where most people meet it - on a line rather than on a dive.

It crushes for a living. Behind small front teeth sit rows of heavy molars that open barnacles, mussels, urchins and crabs, so the fish thrives on exactly the fouling community that grows on breakwaters, pontoons and pilings.

Sex runs the other way from most reef fish. This species is protandrous: fish mature as males and the larger ones become females later, which is the opposite of the wrasses and groupers and means the biggest fish in the population are the egg producers. Fishing that takes the largest individuals therefore removes the females.

It tolerates low salinity well enough to enter estuaries and lagoons, and juveniles use them as nurseries - one of the reasons this species holds up around developed coast where more reef-bound fish disappear.

## Also known as

- **English:** goldlined seabream, Gold-line Sea Bream, yellowfin bream
- **French:** Brème de mer, Gueule pavée, Sargue doré
- **German:** Gelbflossenbrasse, Teerweine
- **Spanish:** Sargo Dorado
- **Portuguese:** Sargo-de-Kwazulu-Natal, Sargo-de-Natal
- **Czech:** mořan žlutoploutvý
- **Japanese:** ヘダイ, Hedai
- **Chinese:** 平鯛, 平鲷, 枋頭
- **Russian:** Желтопёрый тупорыл
- **AF:** Natalse Stompneus
- **DA:** Guldlinjet havrude
- **KO:** 청돔

## Scientific synonyms

- *Austrosparus sarba* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Chrysophrys aries* Temminck & Schlegel, 1843
- *Chrysophrys chrysargyra* Valenciennes, 1830
- *Chrysophrys natalensis* Castelnau, 1861
- *Chrysophrys sarba* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Diplodus auriventris* (Peters, 1855)
- *Diplodus sarba* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Rhabdosargus auriventris* (Peters, 1855)
- *Rhadosarga sarda* Forsskål, 1775
- *Roughleyia tarwhine* Whitley, 1931
- *Sargus auriventris* Peters, 1855
- *Sparus aries* (Temminck & Schlegel, 1843)
- *Sparus bufonites* Lacepède, 1802
- *Sparus natalensis* (Castelnau, 1861)
- *Sparus psittacus* Lacepède, 1802
- *Sparus sarba* Forsskål, 1775

## Range

Djibouti, Eritrea, Federal Republic of Somalia, Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, Red Sea, Republic of Mauritius, Seychelles, South Africa, Tanzania, Western Indian Ocean

---

*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/sea-breams/goldstriped-seabream)*
*Updated: August 13, 2026*