10 Best Goldfish Foods You Need to Try

For hundreds of years, goldfish have been bred to have unique features such as elegant double tails or egg-shaped bodies. The compact size of goldfish can lead to constipation and digestive issues. Therefore, owners invest a lot in finding the best food for their pets. These are the top 10 foods that we have cultivated over decades to provide goldfish with a variety of nutrients and color-enhancing substances.

Note: Some people believe that goldfish should never be given floating foods or else they may gulp air from the surface and end up with intestinal problems. We have never seen any problems with our fish eating floating food. This is despite years of experience. In fact, floating fish food is sometimes preferred because it remains at the surface for fish to find and doesn’t get stuck in the substrate or behind aquarium decorations.

1. Saki Hikari Fancy Goldfish

Saki-Hikari fancy goldfish is a brand that we recommend if you are looking for a high-quality, fish-specific, prepared food. This 3mm sinking pellet is rich in beneficial probiotics, wheat germ and seaweed, which help improve digestion and support intestinal flora. Color-enhancing ingredients, such as astaxanthin and spirulina, help to boost your goldfish’s red coloration without muddying the white areas. These pellets contain Vitamin E, C and other nutrients to support your fish’s immune system. It’s no wonder that people have fallen in love with the Saki-Hikari line of specialized foods for goldfish.

2. Vegetables

Single-tailed goldfish are sleek and torpedo-shaped, but double-tailed fish have balloon-shaped bodies that can lead to blockage, bloating, or swim bladder disease. Many owners add vegetables to their fish’s meals as a preventative measure. Cane green beans, cane zucchini slices, cane carrot slices, and leafy veggies like spinach and lettuce are our favorite vegetables. If the vegetable isn’t soft enough for the goldfish, it may be necessary to blanch it first in boiling water. Also, unshelled peas are often recommended as a cure-all for constipation issues, but be aware that they are a bit messy when placed underwater and can be labor-intensive to feed on a frequent basis.

3. Frozen Fish Food

While it is important to feed goldfish plenty of plant matter to maintain their digestive system’s efficiency, they are omnivores that also need a healthy dose of protein. Frozen foods provide a high-quality food source that is not easily dissolved in water. Your goldfish can forage through the day to find the leftovers on the tank’s bottom. These frozen foods can be purchased at your local fish and pet shops. They come in foil-sealed or frozen slabs. We love krill, daphnia and spirulina salt shrimp as frozen foods for goldfish. The exoskeletons of these crustaceans, which are similar to fiber, do not normally get digested. They help flush the fish’s bowels out and keep them moving along smoothly.

4. Hikari Cichlid Excel

Other fish like African cichlids and freshwater herbivores also need plant-rich diets to avoid bloat. These specially formulated cichlid pellets are full of fish proteins, wheat germ, alfalfa, and spirulina. They also contain color-enhancing krill and spirulina. These pellets, as with all Hikari brand foods are fortified with important minerals and supplements like vitamin A, D3, E, and E. Hikari Cichlid Excel is available in both floating and sinking forms for your convenience.

5. Repashy Super Gold Gel Food

Looking for a goldfish-specific food that isn’t a pellet? Repashy worked with goldfish experts to design a premium gel food with the best ingredients on the market. Goldfish love gel food because it is soft and moist, easy to digest, and gentle on their sensitive swim bladders. If you really want to spoil your goldfish, Repashy Super Gold contains an incredible blend of krill, algae, black soldier fly larvae, squid, seaweed, egg, plant proteins, fruits, flowers, and more. The mixture also contains essential vitamins, calcium, beta carotene, and other color-enhancing ingredients. In addition to Super Gold, goldfish owners like to feed Repashy Soilent Green, an algae- and plant-heavy gel mix with an astounding 8% fiber content. Read this article for easy instructions on how to make Repashy instant gel food in less than 10 minutes.

6. Xtreme Pellets

Xtreme Aquatic Foods has one of the best, all-in-one formulas for omnivore fish, and we regularly feed their pellets to our goldfish, community fish, and cichlids in our retail store and personal aquariums. They have added ingredients that will entice fish to eat, such as shrimp, squid and spirulina. To make a well-rounded, complete diet, they also include important nutrients, vitamins, and minerals for healthy growth and natural color enhancement. All Xtreme fish food products are made in America. You can choose from 1.5mm Floating Pellets or 1.5mm Slow-Sinking Pellets depending on your goldfish.

7. Hikari Gold

Wondering how goldfish and Koi are related? Both of these distant cousins were originally created from carp in East Asia. Therefore, consider bringing in Hikari Gold koi food into your goldfish’s meal schedule. This floating pellet, which is high-quality, was designed for cold-water fish. It contains simple ingredients that can be absorbed quickly by the body, even at lower temperatures. The food is specifically formulated to provide excellent health and prevent fat accumulation. If you’re looking for a budget-friendly, daily diet that will bring out the best growth in your goldfish, give these pellets a shot.

8. Xtreme Spirulina Flake

Spirulina (or cyanobacteria), is a blue-green alga that is widely consumed as a food source for humans and poultry. It is rich in vitamins, minerals, protein, iron, beta-carotene, proteins, and fatty oils. By mixing it with fish, shrimp, and beneficial supplements, Xtreme has created a spirulina flake food that fish love. When raising goldfish fry, the flakes can be easily crumbled to a smaller size that the babies can eat. If you prefer a sinking food instead, Hikari Algae Wafers have an excellent balance of proteins and veggies like seaweed, alfalfa, and spirulina.

9. Hikari Red Parrot+

Most of the foods on this list have been focused on providing good fiber and roughage, but what about getting your fancy goldfish to display the most amazing colors possible? Hikari invented a floating pellet to enhance the coloration in blood parrot cichlids. We’ve also found that it works well with goldfish. The recipe includes a lot of natural color-enhancing ingredients, including chili pepper, phaffia yeast and marigold flowers. It also contains beneficial probiotics that promote healthy growth and help with digestion. Hikari Red Parrot+ can be added to the weekly meal rotation of your goldfish for an extra boost in color.

10. Leftover Plants and Algae

As you probably know, goldfish are more than happy to eat most aquarium plants if given the chance. You might be able to feed your goldfish from an aquarium that is too full of plants or algae. Got aquarium decorations covered in hair algae? You can temporarily move your aquarium decorations into your goldfish fish tank to give them a thorough cleaning. Prune your overgrown stem plants, scoop out your excess floating plants, and toss the trimmings into your goldfish aquarium.

If your tank’s water surface is completely covered in duckweed, consider transferring a goldfish into the afflicted aquarium until all traces of duckweed are gone. (Just be aware that your water piggies may snack on smaller fish if given the chance.)

Thankfully, there are some live plants that are tough enough to withstand goldfish, so if you’re looking to set up a planted goldfish tank, see the following article to learn about the top 5 easy plants we recommend.