The world's biggest fish is the whale shark, Rhincodon typus. The largest individual known was 12.65 meters (41.50 ft) long and weighed 79,000 lb. Unconfirmed reports exist of much larger individuals. (This is not as big as some whales, but whales are not fish — They're mammals.)
Whale sharks have large mouths, which they use to filter feed on plankton (the only other filter-feeding sharks are the megamouth shark, Megachasma pelagios, and the basking shark, Cetorhinus maximus, which is the world's second largest fish). They also eat small fish. The mouth of a large whale shark can open as wide as 1.5 meters (4.9 ft). The teeth are tiny, but the huge mouth typically contains 300 or more concentric tooth rows. There are five gills.
Whale sharks live primarily in the open ocean in warm and tropical waters, but do come inshore at times. They are slow swimmers averaging about five kilometers per hour (3.1 mph). Their life span is about the same as that of a human being. The picture below shows a whale shark at the Georgia Aquarium, in Atlanta, Georgia.
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Range of whale shark, Rhincodon typus
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A whale shark and human shown to scale
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