---
title: Reef Manta Ray (Mobula alfredi)
scientific_name: Mobula alfredi
common_name: Reef Manta Ray
taxon: Mantas and devil rays
conservation_status: VU - Vulnerable
published: 2024-11-05T18:24:40.842Z
updated: 2026-08-14T11:57:51.063Z
tags: Reef Manta Ray, Mobula alfredi, Mantas and devil rays, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/rays/mantas-and-devil-rays/reef-manta-ray
---

# Reef Manta Ray (*Mobula alfredi*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Mantas and devil rays (*Mobula*)
- **Size:** up to 5 m across
- **Weight:** 700 Kg
- **Depth:** 1-120 m
- **Max age:** 50 yrs
- **Diet:** Filter feeder
- **Activity:** Diurnal
- **Rarity:** Rare
- **Habitat:** Coastal reef, cleaning stations and shallow feeding grounds
- **Reproduction:** Live-bearer, Gonochoric
- **CITES:** Appendix I
- **Conservation status:** VU - Vulnerable

## How to recognise it

- large diamond disc, black above with a pale shoulder patch shaped like a Y
- belly spots between the gill slits and behind them, unique to each animal
- mouth at the front of the head, cephalic fins rolled into horns when not feeding
- disc up to 5 m across

A manta of the coast rather than the open ocean: up to 5 m (16 ft) across, black above with a pale shoulder patch shaped like a Y, where the giant oceanic manta wears a T. That patch, plus size, is the field separation, and it matters because the two species were only separated in 2009.

This is the one that stays. Reef mantas hold home ranges of tens of kilometers, use the same cleaning stations for years, and are known individually to researchers and guides from the pattern of black spots on the belly - a fingerprint that does not change over a lifetime that can run past forty years.

Feeding is filtration on the move, and it is choreographed: mantas at a plankton patch form chains nose to tail, barrel-roll in place to stay inside a dense patch, and sometimes gather into slow rotating cyclones of dozens of animals, each one funneling water into the next.

One pup at a time, after a year of gestation, with several years between births. That reproductive rate, plus a habit of visiting predictable places, is why the species is Vulnerable and why the gill-plate trade hurts it so fast.

## Also known as

- **English:** Reef manta ray, Australian Devil Ray, Coastal Manta Ray
- **Arabic:** شفنين الشيطان الأسترالي
- **Hebrew:** מנטת השונית
- **French:** Raie manta de récif, Manta des récifs, Manta d'Alfred
- **Italian:** Manta della barriera corallina, Manta del reef
- **German:** Riffmanta
- **Spanish:** Manta de arrecife, Mantarraya de arrecife, Manta Alfredi
- **Portuguese:** Manta-dos-recifes
- **Japanese:** ナンヨウマンタ, Nan-yomanta, Riifu-oniitomakiei
- **Chinese:** 阿氏前口蝠鱝
- **FI:** nystypaholaisrausku
- **TH:** ปลากระเบนราหูแนวปะการัง, ปลากระเบนแมนตาแนวปะการัง

## Scientific synonyms

- *Ceratoptera alfredi* Krefft, 1868
- *Deratoptera alfredi* Krefft, 1868
- *Manta alfredi* (Krefft, 1868)
- *Manta fowleri* Whitley, 1936
- *Manta pakoka* Whitley, 1936
- *Manta pakota* Whitley, 1936

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*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/rays/mantas-and-devil-rays/reef-manta-ray)*
*Updated: August 14, 2026*