An electric eel is a fish that makes electricity. It is not a true eel. It is more closely related to catfish and carp than to true eels. It has a long, snake-like body and a flat head. It swims with one long fin along its underside. Its skin is thick, with no scales. It is dark on top, with a yellow or orange part underneath. An electric eel can grow to about 2.5 meters, or almost 8 feet, long. As of November 2026, the heaviest published weight is 20 kilograms (44 pounds).

Electric eels live in rivers and ponds in South America. The Amazon and Orinoco river basins hold many of these eels. The water where they live can be muddy and low in oxygen, so the eels breathe air. An eel comes up to the top of the water to breathe. It gets about 80 percent of its oxygen by gulping air at the surface. In the dry season the water in the rivers drops, and eels can be left in small pools.

An electric eel makes electricity with special cells called electrocytes. It has thousands of them. The electrocytes work like a stack of batteries. An electric eel has three electric organs. Most of its body is electric organ. A young electric eel starts to grow electric organs when it is only about 15 millimeters long. Most of the time an electric eel makes only a weak charge, about 10 volts or less.

Electric eels hunt at night. An eel does not see well. It uses the weak charge to find its way and to find prey. An eel can make an electric shock that stuns the animals it eats. Young electric eels eat mostly small animals without backbones, such as insects and crustaceans. Adults eat mostly fish.

Words to know

• electrocytes: power cells
• organs: body parts
• volts: electric units
• prey: food animals
• crustaceans: crab-like animals