60 Fun Facts About Great White Shark

What is the great white shark's scientific name?

The others are the bull shark, tiger shark and shortfin mako.

The genus name Carcharodon combines Greek words meaning what?

The species name carcharias is simply the ancient Greek word for shark.

What Australian English name is used for the species?

All the names refer to the white underside, obvious on a dead shark lying upside down.

Under what name did Linnaeus describe the great white in 1758?

Squalus was his catch-all genus for sharks; Andrew Smith coined Carcharodon in 1838.

Rondelet's 1554 book named the great white 'Lamia' and called it the fish that swallowed whom?

Lamia was a child-eating monster of Greek myth; Pierre Belon had called it Canis carcharias a year earlier.

Which two sharks are larger than the great white?

Both giants are filter feeders.

Roughly how many teeth does a great white have?

They sit in rows like a conveyor belt, with rear teeth moving forward to replace lost ones.

How long can a great white's teeth grow?

Juvenile teeth are pointy for fish; adults' broaden and serrate as marine mammals join the diet.

What fraction of a great white's body weight can its liver reach?

The oil is six times more buoyant than seawater and, per one study, more energy-rich than whale blubber.

What unusual physiological trait lets the great white hunt in cold water?

A rete mirabile of countercurrent blood vessels keeps stomach temperature around 25 °C in 13-16 °C water.

What is the longest reliably measured great white, per a 2014 study of northwest Pacific catch records?

It also found the heaviest at 2,530 kg; the 19th- and 20th-century claims of over 11 m are discredited.

At what length do female great whites reach maturity?

Males mature at 3.4-4.0 m; a 2015 study put female maturity at about 33 years of age.

A 2008 study calculated that a 6.4 m great white could bite with what force at the back of its jaws?

The jaws are separate from the skull and can thrust forward on muscles and tendons.

What are the electroreceptive pits on a shark's snout called?

They are one of five hunting senses; sight and smell appear the most developed.

Why does a great white swim constantly?

It is an obligate ram ventilator; over 95% of its muscle is fast-twitch sprint muscle.

How does a great white protect its eyes when attacking, given it lacks a nictitating membrane?

Their eyes look black but have blue irises and more cones than rods, suggesting daytime vision.

What is the 'White Shark Café'?

Fish and squid may be important food there.

How deep have great whites been recorded diving?

They usually stay near the surface; deeper dives are commoner in the open ocean.

A great white tagged off the Cape swam to Australia and back, covering how far in nine months?

Another made the return trip to southern Australia within a year.

What is a great white's top sprint speed?

Its normal pace is a leisurely 2.9-4.9 km/h.

What might a spyhopping great white be signalling when it repeatedly opens its mouth belly-up?

It has been seen after sharks miss a bait; how they sleep is still poorly understood.

Which seals do great whites mainly target?

Fat but small and inexperienced; a bull elephant seal is as massive as the shark itself.

From roughly how deep does a great white begin its breach on a Cape fur seal?

It rockets up vertically and can clear about 3 m of air.

How do great whites usually attack toothed whales like dolphins?

They target the tail, underside or back; they are likelier to scavenge large whales than hunt them.

How do great whites settle disputes over prey?

The most tenacious splasher wins; they even tail-splash at tiger sharks, boats and cages.

How many distinct forms of body language have been catalogued in great whites?

Most involve two sharks passing, paralleling or circling to size each other up.

How does the great white reproduce?

Embryos eat yolk, then a uterine 'milk', then unfertilised eggs; after about 12 months two to ten pups are born.

How long are great whites at birth?

A possible newborn was filmed for the first time off Carpinteria, California, in July 2023.

A 2015 study concluded male great whites reach maturity at roughly what age?

Females take about 33 years; the species is estimated to live over 70.

Where was the first recorded orca predation on a great white, in 1997?

A 4.7-5.3 m female orca killed a 3-4 m shark; great whites now flee areas when orcas arrive.

How do South African orcas kill great whites?

They hunt in groups of two to six and take only the energy-rich liver.

Which 1971 documentary is credited with introducing the species to the public?

Peter Benchley's Jaws followed in 1974 and Spielberg's film in 1975.

Who wrote the 1974 novel Jaws and later regretted the man-eater image it created?

Steven Spielberg directed the 1975 film adaptation.

The mechanical sharks in Jaws were nicknamed 'Bruce' after whom?

Three pneumatic props were built, and they malfunctioned so often that Spielberg mostly hid the shark.

Where was Jaws mostly filmed?

It was the first major film shot on the ocean and ran badly over budget and schedule.

How much did Alf Dean's record 1959 rod-and-reel catch off Port Lincoln weigh?

A bigger one from Streaky Bay was disqualified over the bait used.

How many unprovoked great white bites on humans had been documented since 1580, as of 2024?

59 were fatal; the species tops the list among sharks but does not appear to see humans as prey.

Some experts think which species, not a great white, was behind the 1916 Jersey Shore attacks?

The attacks helped inspire Jaws.

The 'mistaken identity' hypothesis for attacks says a surfer's silhouette resembles what?

A 2021 study backed it, arguing sharks are colourblind; others say bites are exploratory 'test bites'.

Which institution kept great whites most successfully, displaying six between 2004 and 2011?

One shark stayed 198 days and drew a million visitors; a 4-million-gallon net pen let them recover from capture first.

Sandy, a 2.3 m great white kept at Steinhart Aquarium in 1980, was released after how long?

She kept bumping into the walls.

Which government banned great white tourism at Guadalupe Island in January 2023?

It cited people swimming outside cages, sloppy chumming and two sharks hurt in cage bars.

How does the IUCN classify the great white globally?

It is Critically Endangered in European and Mediterranean waters, where fewer than 250 mature sharks remain.

Which country was the first to protect the great white, in 1991?

Australia followed federally in 1999, the US in 1997 and New Zealand in 2007.

A 2025 study estimated the global great white population at a minimum of roughly how many?

Co-author Gavin Naylor suggested the true figure may be nearer 20,000.

As many as how many individual great whites are documented visiting Cape Cod?

The Marine Mammal Protection Act restored the seals; Massachusetts banned chumming for sharks in 2015.

Which stretch of water splits Australia's great whites into eastern and western groups?

A 2012 study found the split, calling for regional conservation strategies.

Which extinct giant did the great white's ancestors replace as they spread globally in the Pliocene?

The white shark descends from Carcharodon hubbelli, which evolved serrated teeth from C. hastalis.

A 2024 nuclear DNA study split great whites into how many major clades?

North Atlantic, Indo-Pacific and North Pacific, diverging perhaps 100,000-200,000 years ago.

Great whites can tolerate unusually high blood levels of which toxic metals?

Their genome also shows positive selection for wound-healing genes.

Roughly what number of parasite species are known to infest great whites?

One shark yielded 2,533 tapeworms of a single species from its spiral valve.

The great white belongs to which family of sharks, alongside makos and the porbeagle?

Lamnidae has five living species: the great white, two makos, the porbeagle and the salmon shark.

What is the coloration pattern of a great white, dark above and pale below, called?

Countershading camouflages the shark from both above and below; its back is usually blue-gray or gray-brown.

Great whites are estimated to live to beyond what age?

Age estimates were revised sharply upward once researchers found the sharks mature much later than once thought.

In which ocean basin does the great white first appear in the fossil record?

Because shark skeletons are cartilage, the overwhelming majority of great white fossils are teeth.

Under which CITES listing does trade in great white specimens or parts require permits?

Appendix II covers species not necessarily threatened with extinction but in which trade must be controlled.

How does the IUCN classify the great white regionally in European and Mediterranean waters?

Fewer than 250 mature great whites are thought to remain in European waters, most of them in the Mediterranean.

Which 1972 US law boosted seal numbers and, in turn, the great whites of Cape Cod?

Cape Cod great whites hunt seals in shallow, murky water, striking them from the sides.

Great whites off Guadalupe Island carry scars attributed to which unusual attackers?

Neon flying squids, jumbo squids and giant squids have all been blamed for the marks.

In 2007, New Zealand gave great whites full protection out to how far from land?

The protection also covers New Zealand-flagged vessels operating internationally; the species is listed as Nationally Endangered there.