Perch Fish: True Perch vs Fish Called Perch, and Eating

A perch, in the strict sense, is one of three species in the genus Perca, family Percidae (Wikipedia):

• European perch (Perca fluviatilis): Europe and northern Asia, introduced to Australia and South Africa; green with dark vertical bars and red or orange lower fins
• Yellow perch (Perca flavescens): North America, especially the Great Lakes; smaller and paler than the European perch
• Balkhash perch (Perca schrenkii): Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and China, around 1.5 kg

All three have two separate dorsal fins, the first with spines and the second soft, and rough ctenoid scales (Wikipedia). They are carnivores of lakes, rivers and weedy streams, eating small fish, shellfish, zooplankton and insect larvae.

Walleye and sauger are in the same family, Percidae, and Fishing Booker counts them as true perch relatives, along with the tiny darters.

Many fish carry the name without belonging to Perca. The common ones in North America:

• White perch: a temperate bass, related to the striped bass; lives in both salt and fresh water on the East Coast and in the Great Lakes; record 3 lb 8 oz, most under 1 lb (Fishing Booker)
• Silver perch: a drum, related to redfish and weakfish; rarely over 12 inches, found in tidal creeks and seagrass on the East Coast (Fishing Booker)
• Pacific ocean perch (Sebastes alutus): a rockfish from California to the western Aleutians; about 20 in and 4 lb, and it may live to 98 years (NOAA Fisheries)

Menus add to the confusion. Wikipedia notes that white perch, rock bass and several sunfish are sometimes sold as perch in restaurants. If you want to know what you caught or were served, the two-dorsal-fin test above separates a true perch from most of these.

• Yellow perch: perch, striped perch, American perch or preacher (Wikipedia)
• European perch: redfin perch, English perch, Euro perch or Eurasian river perch (Wikipedia)

In Australia, redfin perch is the usual name for the introduced European perch, which Wikipedia says has caused substantial damage to native fish and is proclaimed a noxious species in New South Wales.

The true perches have a strong reputation at the table. Wikipedia describes yellow perch as among the finest flavoured pan fish, with a mild flavour prized by anglers and commercial fishermen; nearly 70% of US yellow perch sales happen within about 80 km of the Great Lakes. European perch is described as good eating, with white, firm, flaky flesh, and 28,920 tonnes were caught commercially in 2013 (Wikipedia). Fishing Booker ranks yellow perch as the tastiest of the perch-named fish it covers, and calls white perch great eating too.

Pacific ocean perch is a different fish with a different profile: NOAA Fisheries describes a delicate, nutty flavour and lean, fairly firm texture, with 94 calories and 18.62 g of protein per 100 g raw.

For fish you catch yourself, check your state or local consumption advisory for that water before eating them.

Not in the way carp or catfish are. Wikipedia describes yellow perch as daytime feeders that school during the day and become inactive at night. Young fish eat zooplankton; adults take aquatic invertebrates, fish eggs, crayfish, mysid shrimp and small fish, and larger perch become mainly fish eaters. They do pick food off the bottom, but they hunt through the water rather than rooting in the mud.

Are perch and tilapia the same fish? No. Tilapia is the common name for nearly a hundred species of cichlid fish native to Africa and the Middle East (Wikipedia), a different family from the perches.

Research and drafting for this page were assisted by AI, and every figure was checked against the sources listed below on 25 September 2026. Where two sources disagree, both figures are given with their source.