Jaguar

Open encyclopedia reference

The jaguar (Panthera onca) is a large cat species and the only living member of the genus Panthera that is native to the Americas. Its coat features pale yellow to tan colored fur covered with spots that transition to rosettes on the sides; some individuals have a melanistic spotted coat. With a body length of up to 1.85 m (6 ft 1 in) and a weight of up to 158 kg (348 lb), it is the biggest cat species in the Americas and the third largest in the world. The jaguar's powerful bite allows it to pierce the carapaces of turtles and tortoises, and to employ an unusual killing method: it bites directly through the skull of mammalian prey between the ears to deliver a fatal blow to the brain. The modern jaguar's ancestors probably entered the Americas from Eurasia during the Early Pleistocene via the land bridge that once spanned the Bering Strait. The oldest jaguar fossils found in North America date to between 0.85 to 0.82 million years ago.

Wikipedia contributors, Jaguar; see linked history · CC BY-SA 4.0 . Plain-text lead excerpt, at most 180 words; no infobox or later sections Retrieved 2026-10-05T01:20:39.492652+00:00. This reference remains separate from the taxonomic record.

Identity & source status

Scientific name

Panthera onca (Linnaeus, 1758)

Name authority

(Linnaeus, 1758)

Common name

Jaguar

Rank

species

Accepted status

accepted

Kingdom

Animalia

Phylum

Chordata

Class

Mammalia

Order

Carnivora

Family

Felidae

Genus

Panthera

Extinction status

Recorded extant

Classification family tree

Nested taxonomic groups from the source. This is not a direct-ancestor chain, a dated evolutionary tree or a phylogenetic reconstruction.

1. domainEukaryota (Chatton, 1925) Whittaker & Margulis, 1978
2. kingdomAnimalia
3. phylumChordata
4. subphylumVertebrata
5. infraphylumGnathostomata
6. parvphylumOsteichthyes
7. megaclassTetrapoda
8. classMammalia Linnaeus, 1758
9. subclassTheria Parker & Haswell, 1897
10. infraclassEutheria Gill, 1872
11. orderCarnivora Bowdich, 1821
12. suborderFeliformia Kretzoi, 1945
13. familyFelidae Fischer de Waldheim, 1817
14. subfamilyPantherinae Pocock, 1917
15. genusPanthera Oken, 1816
16. speciesPanthera onca (Linnaeus, 1758)

Close classified relatives

These entries share the source’s genus, Panthera. They are not necessarily the closest relatives established by molecular evidence.

Browse 41 records assigned to Felidae.

Names & synonyms

Names explicitly linked to this accepted taxon in the source. Synonymy can change with revision.

Documented distribution

Source distribution statements, not a complete range map. A listed locality is not necessarily a place of origin.

Source literature & publication evidence

References attached to this source record, including nomenclatural citations where supplied. This is a selected bibliography; abbreviated citations remain in the source’s form.

1. https://www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=180593 Source fields: Taxon.tsv dwc:namePublishedIn, Taxon.tsv dcterms:references

Origins, evidence & remaining research

Name authority and publication references document nomenclature where the source supplies it. They do not establish evolutionary origins or the earliest fossil occurrence.

Specimen-level evidence, morphology, ecological research, phylogenetic studies, a comprehensive bibliography and a located literary passage have not yet been compiled for this record. A suitable sourced image remains to be added.

Dataset citation & attribution

This exact taxon in ChecklistBank · Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11

Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11; dataset 316321; doi:10.48580/dgz5n. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . Retrieved 5 October 2026.

Stable key: col:4CGXQ. Classification follows source parent identifiers. English common names may vary by region.