---
title: Dwarf Sperm Whale (Kogia sima)
scientific_name: Kogia sima
common_name: Dwarf Sperm Whale
taxon: Whales
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2026-08-05T11:30:33.680Z
updated: 2026-08-14T11:57:50.769Z
tags: Dwarf Sperm Whale, Kogia sima, Whales, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/mammals/whales/dwarf-sperm-whale
---

# Dwarf Sperm Whale (*Kogia sima*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Whales (*Balaenopteridae*)
- **Size:** up to 2.7 m
- **Weight:** 136 to 272 kg
- **Depth:** 0-300 m
- **Max age:** 23 yrs
- **Diet:** Carnivore
- **Activity:** Nocturnal
- **Rarity:** Very Rare
- **Habitat:** Deep water beyond the shelf edge, seen at the surface only when resting
- **Reproduction:** Live-bearer, Gonochoric
- **CITES:** Appendix II
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- small blunt-headed whale, shark-like in profile, with a pale crescent behind the eye
- tall dorsal fin set at the middle of the back, unlike the Pygmy Sperm Whale's small one
- lies motionless at the surface with the head down, and does not flee
- length up to 2.7 m

A blunt-headed whale barely 2.7 m (9 ft) long with a squared-off snout, a tall central fin and a pale crescent behind the eye that looks enough like a gill slit to have earned it the nickname false gill. The whole profile is oddly shark-like, which is not a coincidence anyone has explained.

It releases ink. A sac in the lower intestine holds over ten liters of reddish-brown fluid, and a startled animal voids it into the water and disappears behind the cloud - the same defense a squid uses, in a mammal, and the only case of it. In young animals the cloud is proportionally enormous.

It hunts squid in deep water, mostly at night, and spends the day lying motionless at the surface with the head low and the tail hanging - a habit that makes it easy to approach, easy to hit with a boat and easy to overlook entirely. Most of what is known about the species comes from strandings rather than sightings.

How common it is nobody knows. It is rarely seen anywhere, and the few records from this region are consistent with an animal that lives past the drop-off and surfaces without being noticed.

## Also known as

- **English:** cachalote anão, dwarf sperm whale, snub-nosed cachalot
- **French:** cachalot nain
- **Italian:** cogia di Owen, cogia
- **German:** kleiner Zwergpottwal, kleiner Pottwal, Kleinstpottwal
- **Spanish:** cachalote enano
- **Greek:** Νάνος φυσητήρας
- **Turkish:** cüce ispermecet balinası, cüce sperm balinası
- **Portuguese:** cachalote anao
- **Dutch:** Kleinste potvis
- **Polish:** kogia płaskonosa
- **Japanese:** ogawa komakko kujira, オガワコマッコウ
- **Chinese:** 侏儒抹香鯨, 侏抹香鲸
- **Ukrainian:** Кашалот малий карликовий, Малий карликовий кашалот
- **Russian:** Карликовый кашалот
- **AF:** dwergpotvis, Miniatuurpotvis
- **ID:** paus lodan kecil
- **KO:** soe-hyang-gorae
- **LT:** mažasis nykštukinis kašalotas
- **SL:** pritlikavi glavač
- **TEL:** wonga
- **TH:** plawan hua thui khrae

## Scientific synonyms

- *Callignathus simus* Gill, 1871
- *Kogia simus* (Owen, 1866)
- *Physeter (Euphyseter) simus* Owen, 1866
- *Physeter simus* Owen, 1866

## Range

Gulf of Mexico, New Zealand, North Atlantic Ocean

---

*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/mammals/whales/dwarf-sperm-whale)*
*Updated: August 14, 2026*