---
title: Blacktip Reef Shark (Carcharhinus melanopterus)
scientific_name: Carcharhinus melanopterus
common_name: Blacktip Reef Shark
taxon: Requiem shark
conservation_status: VU - Vulnerable
published: 2024-11-03T22:11:49.740Z
updated: 2026-08-14T11:57:51.028Z
tags: Blacktip Reef Shark, Carcharhinus melanopterus, Requiem shark, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/sharks/requiem-shark/blacktip-reef-shark
---

# Blacktip Reef Shark (*Carcharhinus melanopterus*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Requiem shark (*Carcharhinidae*)
- **Size:** 1.6 - 2 m
- **Weight:** 13.6 Kg
- **Depth:** 1-75 m
- **Diet:** Carnivore
- **Activity:** Cathemeral
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Reef flats, lagoons and shallow sand, often in very shallow water
- **Reproduction:** Live-bearer
- **Hazard:** Dangerous
- **CITES:** Appendix II
- **Conservation status:** VU - Vulnerable

## How to recognise it

- jet-black tip on the first dorsal fin, outlined in white
- slim gray body, all fins black-tipped
- often in water shallow enough to expose the dorsal fin
- length to about 1.6 m

The shark of the shallows: 1.6 m (5 ft) of slim gray body with a jet-black tip on the first dorsal fin, outlined in white and often visible above the surface as the animal works a lagoon in half a meter of water. Every fin is black-tipped, and the first dorsal marking is the clearest of any reef shark here.

It barely goes anywhere. Tracking studies find individuals holding home ranges of less than a square kilometer and returning to the same stretch of reef for years, sometimes for their whole adult life. A blacktip reef shark seen on a house reef is very likely the same animal seen there last season, and that fidelity is why local populations do not recover when a lagoon is fished out: nothing swims in to replace them.

Juveniles use the shallowest water available, sometimes in a few centimeters over a sand flat, where nothing large enough to eat them can follow. The adults hunt small fish, octopus and crabs across the reef flat at the top of the tide.

It is timid to the point of being difficult to photograph, and it accounts for almost no incidents beyond bites on the legs of people wading through schooling bait. The species is Vulnerable, and it is the shark most non-divers here will actually see.

## Also known as

- **English:** blacktip reef shark, Black Tip Shark, Black-tip Reef Shark
- **Arabic:** قرش الشعاب أسود الطرف, قرش الزعانف السوداء, Jarjur
- **Hebrew:** כריש שחור-סנפירים
- **French:** Requin à pointes noires, Requin pointe noire, Requin pointes noires
- **Italian:** Squalo pinna nera del reef, Squalo pinne nere di scogliera
- **German:** Schwarzspitzen-Riffhai
- **Spanish:** Tiburón de puntas negras, Tiburón Punta Negra
- **Turkish:** Siyah Uçlu Resif Köpek Balığı, kopek baligi, camgoz
- **Portuguese:** Tubarão negro, Fungu, Tubarão-galha-preta-de-recife
- **Dutch:** Zwartpuntrifhaai
- **Czech:** Žralok černoploutvý
- **Japanese:** ツマグロ, Tsumaguro
- **Chinese:** 大沙, 汙翅真鯊, 污翅白眼鮫
- **Russian:** Мальгашская ночная акула, Черноперая рифовая акула, Чернопёрая рифовая акула
- **DA:** Sorttippet revhaj
- **FI:** Mustaevähai
- **HU:** feketeúszójú szirticápa
- **ID:** Hiu karang sirip hitam
- **KO:** 흑기흉상어
- **MSA:** Yu punai
- **SL:** črnoplavuti morski pes
- **SLK:** Žralok čiernohrotý
- **SQI:** peshkaqeni pendëzi, Peshkaqen
- **TAH:** ma'o mauri
- **TAM:** பெருந்தலை சுறா
- **TH:** ปลาฉลามครีบดำ, ปลาฉลามหูดำ

## Scientific synonyms

- *Carcharhinus melanoptures* (Quoy & Gaimard, 1824)
- *Carcharhinus melanoterus* (Quoy & Gaimard, 1824)
- *Carcharias commersoni* (Blainville, 1816)
- *Carcharias elegans* Ehrenberg, 1871
- *Carcharias marianensis* Engelhardt, 1912
- *Carcharias melanopterus* Quoy & Gaimard, 1824
- *Carcharias playfairii* Günther, 1870
- *Carcharinus melanoptera* (Quoy & Gaimard, 1824)
- *Carcharinus melanopterus* (Quoy & Gaimard, 1824)
- *Hypoprion playfairi* (Günther, 1870)
- *Squalus carcharias minor* Forsskål, 1775
- *Squalus commersonii* Blainville, 1816
- *Squalus ustus* Duméril, 1824

## Range

Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Federal Republic of Somalia, Indian Ocean, Kenya, Madagascar, Mediterranean Sea - Eastern Basin, Mozambique, North Atlantic Ocean, Red Sea, Republic of Mauritius, Seychelles, South Africa, Tanzania, Western Indian Ocean

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*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/sharks/requiem-shark/blacktip-reef-shark)*
*Updated: August 14, 2026*