A group of living things
Jawed vertebrates
Gnathostomata
Jaws changed everything and opened a whole new menu.
Its members' last common ancestor lived about 465 million years ago.
You are part of this group. See how.
Jaws changed everything: they opened up a whole new menu. Early vertebrates without jaws fed by scavenging or sieving tiny food from the water. With hinged jaws and two pairs of fins for careful steering, the first jawed vertebrates could grab and hunt. They went on to replace most jawless fishes.
You are part of this family. It holds sharks, guppies and lungfish, plus amphibians, reptiles (including extinct dinosaurs and birds) and mammals. In one branch, fleshy fins with bones inside became limbs that could prop the body up on land. Even whales and snakes, which have lost some or all of their limbs, still belong here by ancestry.
Today they live almost everywhere, from deep oceans to rivers and ponds, and on land and in the air. They range from fishes smaller than your little fingernail to blue whales about as long as three buses. They feed in many ways: giant sharks sieve plankton and rays crush shellfish with flat plates. Only a few sharks are dangerous to people.
Jaws from gills
Early in growth, some arches near the gills change course to form the jaws and their supports.
First known colours
The oldest colours known in any vertebrate come from an armoured fossil fish, silvery below and red above, which hints it may have seen colour.
The most species
There are more than 30,000 fish species, more than for birds, mammals, reptiles or amphibians alone.