Top 10 Ugliest Animals in the World: Celebrating Nature’s Diversity

Ever think about the wild and weird aspect of the beautiful Mother Nature? Join us in this journey to unveil the top 10 ugliest animals in the world, which are present around us, yet we don’t like to observe them due to their strange looks. The following list may seem to be very weird as these animals challenge all the misconceptions with their confident appearance. Get ready as we are going to delve into a very unreal side of Mother Nature to search out the ugliest animals in the world!

1. Blobfish

Blobfish – one of the weirdest animals in the world – is best known for its peculiar appearance like a tadpole fish, which is very suitable to help them to float on ocean floor. The most important features of this fish species are their soft and jelly-like body, rounded heads, large jaws, greyish or whitish pink color, pointed tails, loose skin, soft bones and fluffy pectoral fins.

Being around 12 inches in length with 20 pounds weight, blobfish are commonly found in the deep waters off the coasts of Australia and Tasmania. They move very easily at the depths of 2000 – 4000 ft, in fact, this huge pressure gives them their shape. However, if we brought them up on the surface, their appearance may change due to changes in pressure.

Unlike most fish, blobfish don’t have a swim bladder to control their buoyancy. This adaptation allows them to thrive in the extreme water pressure of the deep sea! To learn more about how deep-sea creatures survive in such harsh environments, check out the Smithsonian Ocean Portal: Smithsonian Ocean Portal Deep Sea Creatures.

2. Proboscis Monkey

The proboscis monkey is considered as one of the ugliest animals in the world due to its unusual appearance, especially its long and bulbous nose and webbed feet. They appear in pink and brown color, red color around their heads and shoulders, and grey colored tail, legs and arms. Interestingly, infants have blue colored face that darkens to grey at the age of 2.5 months.

Habitat of proboscis monkey is mangroves and swamps of Borneo, Malaysia with herbivorous diet including, leaves, seeds, and fruits, (occasionally insects too). A proboscis monkey weighs 16 – 22 kg with the height of 26 – 30 inches. The unique abilities of these monkeys include excellent swimming, jumping on tree branches, and diving into the water with a slapstick belly flop.

3. Aye-Aye

Aye-Aye is one of the largest nocturnal primate in the world, known for its odd look, including rodent-like (continuously growing) teeth, scraggly hair, bloated eyes, large ears, and long and bony middle finger. It appears in a color in between dark brown and black. The main feature due to which it is distinguished includes its bushy tail which is longer than its body.

Normally, length of an aye-aye is between 14 – 17 inches, 16 inches height and weight ranging between 4 – 6 pounds. It has very unusual way to find its food by tapping its middle finger on trees to find grubs. Its hunting method is known as percussive foraging in which it makes hole and take food out by its long narrow finger. If you’d like to see the Aye-Aye’s amazing foraging technique in action, check out this video from the BBC: Aye-Aye – Madagascar’s Strangest Lemur BBC Wildlife.

4. Naked Mole-Rat

Naked mole-rat is an important member of our list of top 10 ugliest animals in the world due to its strange and weird look. It has greyish pink appearance with hair-free and crumpled skin, small size (3 – 4 inches in length) with weight around 1.5 ounces. However, it has a few fine hairs on body, which act like navigation whiskers. It is one of the longest living rodents on earth, which can live up to 30 years in the wild.

This naked rodent is mostly found in the underground areas of East Africa, where it lives underground in the form of colonies (with 80 – 300 individuals), just like many insects. It is believed that naked mole rat is blind as it spends all its life underground. Other than its appearance, naked mole rat has a unique ability to resist cancer due to which it is being studied to prevent cancer in humans.

5. Star-nosed Mole

Star nosed mole is one of the ugliest animals in the world due to its odd look. It has very distinct features such as short fur, star shaped nose (with 22 fleshy appendages), brownish black body, flaking tail, covered ears, small eyes.

It has more than 25,000 sensory receptors (called Eimer organs) which are very helpful in finding prey and navigate in dark environment. It eats earth-worms, aquatic insects, snails, and fish. The star-nosed mole is commonly found in swamps of eastern Canada and northeastern US, living for 2 – 3 years in the wild.

6. Matamata Turtle

Matamata turtles are considered among the top 10 ugliest animals in the world. The word “matamata” is Spanish, which means “Kill! Kill!” This odd looking large turtle has pancake-shaped body, long and wart-filled neck, a flat head, an unhappy nose, twisted and rough shell, and 4 clawed feet. This freshwater turtle is native to South America with the body length around 18 inches and weight around 15 kg.

Unlike other turtle species, matamata turtle has various skin fringes and crests on its neck. Moreover, it has relatively large and wide mouth. Its shell and neck is dark brown colored, whereas the underside of shell (plastron) is light orange or pink colored. Its body colors keep changing with the age (lifespan: 15 years), turning them into yellow and brown colors.

7. Warthog

Warthogs are commonly known for their uneven look including odd-shaped heads, pig nose, growths on their faces, mane of hair, sharp and large tusks, and lumps covering whole body. Their body has very thin hair (blackish brown) and appears greyish brown with long tails, ending in a bunch of hair.

This pig-like mammal typically measures around 35 – 59 inches with height around 24 – 35 inches and weight around 60 – 150 kg. They live in burrows in which they enter their tail first. They are commonly found across sub-Saharan Africa, mostly in woodland and savannahs, feeding on grasses, roots, fruits, and rarely insects.

8. Vulture

Vultures are considered as ugly animals because they look really weird among other birds.  They have long and wrinkly red heads, toddles on neck, pale eyes, featherless head, and pale beak. They appear black if you are watching them from a distance, however, if you get closer, they will appear dark brown.

Their body size is around 22 – 32 inches, wingspan of 5 – 6 ft, weight of 4 – 6 kg and height around 2.5 ft. They spend most of their time in finding the putrid meat or other decaying food to maintain the balance in the ecosystem. Due to this, they are best known as ‘Nature’s Clean-up Crew’, because they help to clean the African landscapes like no other can.

9. Marabou Stork

Marabou storks are an important part of our list of top 10 ugliest animals in the world, because they are among the biggest birds in the world too which are found in sub-Saharan Africa, living in both wet and dry habitats. They mostly eat termites, flamingoes, carrion, fish, lizards, baby crocodiles, snakes, locusts, rats, and frogs.

These strange and large walking birds have pink hairless heads (with tufts), brown long neck, long legs, wingspan around 2.6 m, height of 1.5 m, weight around 4 – 9 kg, hollow bones (leg and feet), white collar, and slack pump-up skin on the neck. They have long lifespans of 43 years in confinement, which reduces to 25 years in the wild.

10. Anglerfish

The Anglerfish completes our search of top 10 ugliest animals in the world by its odd look. It is a species of fish which is found in the deep and dark depths (0-1000m) of the Atlantic and Antarctic oceans. Its distinct features include glowing bait protruding from its head (for attracting prey), huge head, sickle-shaped mouth, and translucent teeth.

They appear in grey or dark brown color with body length in between 1 – 3.3 ft and weight around 2 – 5 kg. One of the most important fact about angler fish is the presence of a fishing rod on the top of their mouths (known as dorsal spine). Their large sized mouths are very flexible, which help them to eat their double sized prey!

Decoding the Rankings

FAQs