Styracosaurus Facts for Kids
sty-RACK-oh-SORE-us · its name means “spiked lizard”
A horned dinosaur with long spikes all around its frill.
- 📏 18 ft5.5 m1 long
- ⚖️ weight: not yet checked
- 🕰️ the Cretaceous
- 🍽️ plants
Styracosaurus had a big horn on its nose. Long spikes stood up around its frill. It ate plants.
Styracosaurus had one long horn on its nose and a crown of long spikes around the edge of its bony frill. It was a cousin of Triceratops, but smaller.
Its spiky frill was probably for showing off to other Styracosaurus, and may have made it look bigger to meat-eaters. Scientists have found its fossils in Dinosaur Provincial Park in Alberta, Canada. Like Triceratops, it had a parrot-like beak.
Every dinosaur number is scientists’ best guess from bones, so each one says where it came from.
How big was Styracosaurus?
Styracosaurus in numbers
| Length (nose to tail) | 18 ft5.5 m1scientists' estimate |
|---|---|
| Height at the hips | no checked number yet |
| Weight | no checked number yet |
| When it lived | no checked number yet |
| What it ate | low, tough plants |
| Fossils found in | Alberta, in Canada, and Montana |
| What kind | a ceratopsian: a horned, frilled plant-eater |
Wow!
- Long spikes ringed its frill like a crown.
- It had a parrot-like beak.
- It was a smaller cousin of Triceratops.
🦴 Styracosaurus’s bones
Books about Styracosaurus, free at the library
Ask a grown-up to tap the button: it shows where to borrow a book about Styracosaurus for free.
Where was the land back then?
The continents were in different places when Styracosaurus lived, in the Cretaceous. Open Planet Earth, pick Drifting continents, and slide back in time to see where the land was.
Its neighbours in time
Where these numbers come from
- Wikidata, from the Natural History Museum's Dino Directory, checked 30 October 2026.
- Wikidata, Styracosaurus (Q14483), checked 30 October 2026.
To read more: the Natural History Museum’s Dino Directory (see also, not copied).