Animals · Curated list
Chicken, Common ostrich, House sparrow and 27 more, ranked by how much of the world has written about each one.
Most written-about first. Each description summarises the bird's Wikipedia article, which its name links to.
1
Domesticated subspecies of red junglefowl
The domesticated form of the red junglefowl, a bird originally from Southeast Asia. First domesticated about 8,000 years ago, it is one of the commonest and most widespread domestic animals in the world.
Wikidata · Photo: Kruppert_Cubalaya.JPG : Kruppert, CC BY-SA 3.0
2
Species of flightless bird
Also called simply the ostrich, a flightless bird native to parts of Africa, and the largest bird species alive. Only two species of ostrich survive, both in the genus Struthio, among the ratite birds, and this is one of them.
Wikidata · Photo: Knowledge and philosophy, CC BY-SA 4.0
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3
Species of bird
A small bird of the family Passeridae, the sparrows, found across most of the world. It is typically 16 cm (6.3 in) long and weighs 24–39.5 g (0.85–1.39 oz).
Wikidata · Photo: Rhododendrites, CC BY-SA 4.0
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4
Large, black species of passerine bird
Also called the northern raven, a large passerine bird, black all over. It is the most widely spread of all the corvids, living throughout the Northern Hemisphere.
Wikidata · Photo: Franco Folini from San Francisco, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0
5
Species of bird
Also called the common magpie, a bird that breeds and stays year-round across the northern part of Eurasia. It is one of several members of the crow family (corvids) called magpies, and belongs to the Holarctic radiation of "monochrome" magpies.
Wikidata · Photo: Alexis Lours, CC BY 4.0
6
Species of duck
Also called the wild duck, a dabbling duck that breeds across Eurasia, North Africa and the temperate and subtropical Americas. It has been introduced to South Africa, the Falkland Islands, Colombia, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil, Peru, Australia and New Zealand.
Wikidata · Photo: Calibas (edit by Aqwis ), CC BY-SA 3.0
7
Species of bird
Also called the common hoopoe, the most widespread hoopoe species. A distinctive cinnamon-coloured bird, it has black and white wings, a tall crest it can raise, a black tail crossed by a broad white band, and a long, narrow bill that curves down.
8
Thrush native to Europe, western Asia and North Africa
A true thrush, also called the Eurasian blackbird or just the blackbird.
Wikidata · Photo: Kahvilokki, CC BY-SA 4.0
9
Species of bird
Also called the European quail, a small game bird of the pheasant family, Phasianidae, that nests on the ground. Mostly migratory, it breeds in the Palearctic and spends the winter in southern India and Africa.
Wikidata · Photo: christoph_moning, CC BY 4.0
10
Species of bird
In the British Isles simply the robin, or robin redbreast, a small insect-eating passerine bird of the Old World flycatcher family, Muscicapidae. It lives throughout Europe, eastward to Western Siberia and southward to North Africa.
Wikidata · Photo: Francis C. Franklin, CC BY-SA 3.0
11
Species of bird
Also called the common, European or Eurasian cuckoo, a bird of the cuckoo order, Cuculiformes, an order that also takes in the coucals, the anis and the roadrunners.
Wikidata · Photo: Cuculus_canorus_vogelartinfo_chris_romeiks_CHR0791.jpg : Vogelartinfo derivative work: Bogbumper ( talk ), GFDL 1.2
12
Extinct species of bird
An extinct flightless bird found only on Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean east of Madagascar. Its nearest relative was the Rodrigues solitaire, likewise flightless and likewise extinct.
Wikidata · Photo: BazzaDaRambler, CC BY 2.0
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13
Ancestor of domestic pigeon
Also called the common pigeon or rock pigeon, a bird of the family Columbidae. It is often just called the "pigeon", but the rock dove is the wild bird; the pigeons most people know are its domesticated forms.
Wikidata · Photo: william_stephens, CC BY 4.0
14
Species of bird
Also called the common golden oriole, a passerine bird about 24cm long, whose wings span 44-45cm. No other Old World oriole breeds in the temperate Northern Hemisphere. It spends summer in Europe and the Palearctic and winters in central and southern Africa.
Wikidata · Photo: Paco Gómez from Castellón, Spain, CC BY-SA 2.0
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15
Species of passerine birds
Known as just the starling in Ireland and Great Britain, and in North America as the European starling, a medium-sized passerine bird of the starling family, Sturnidae. Some 20 cm (8 in) long, it is glossy black with a metallic sheen, flecked with white at certain times of year.
Wikidata · Photo: marsupium photography, CC BY-SA 2.0
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16
Species of bird
A small passerine bird of the family Motacillidae, which also contains longclaws and pipits. It breeds across the Palearctic, in most of Asia and Europe and parts of North Africa, and a few breed in western Alaska, a small foothold there.
Wikidata · Photo: Jac. Janssen from BAARLO LB, NL, CC BY 2.0
17
Species of bird
A passerine bird of the family Corvidae. Its plumage is pinkish brown, with a black tail, a vivid blue patch on the upper wing, and a black stripe on each side of its whitish throat.
Wikidata · Photo: Luc Viatour, CC BY-SA 3.0
18
Long-legged predatory wading bird
A wading bird with long legs, one of the herons (the family Ardeidae), native across temperate Asia and Europe and in parts of Africa. In much of its range it stays all year, but some populations from farther north fly south in autumn.
Wikidata · Photo: Vassilios Vescoukis, CC BY-SA 4.0
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19
Passerine bird in the tit family Paridae
A small passerine bird of the tit family, Paridae. It is common and widespread across Europe, the Middle East and Central Asia, and eastward as far as the Amur River.
Wikidata · Photo: Frank Vassen from Brussels, Belgium, CC BY 2.0
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20
Species of bird
The most widespread swallow in the world, found on every continent, with strays reported even in Antarctica. This distinctive passerine is blue above, with a long, deeply forked tail.
Wikidata · Photo: Morhaf Aljanee, CC BY-SA 3.0
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21
Species of eagle
A bird of prey of the Northern Hemisphere, the most widely distributed of all eagles.
Wikidata · Photo: Jarkko Järvinen, CC BY-SA 2.0
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22
Species of bird in the crow family Corvidae
Also called the Eurasian or European jackdaw, or simply the jackdaw, a passerine bird of the crow family. It lives across Europe and western Asia and in the west of North Africa; most stay year-round, but northern and eastern populations fly south for the winter.
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23
Species of owl
An eagle-owl found across much of Eurasia, often called just the eagle-owl in Asia and Europe.
Wikidata · Photo: Marton Berntsen, CC BY-SA 4.0
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24
Fastest known animal and common bird of prey
Also called just the peregrine, a bird of prey (raptor) of the family Falconidae, famous for its speed. A large falcon, about as big as a crow, it has a blue-grey back, white underparts with bars, and a black head.
Wikidata · Photo: Gregory "Slobirdr" Smith, CC BY-SA 2.0
25
Species of bird
A widespread seabird of the cormorant family. Its many names include just cormorant in Britain, black shag or kawau in New Zealand, black cormorant in Australia and large cormorant in India, and throughout the Northern Hemisphere it was once called the great black cormorant. Its breeding range covers North America's Atlantic coast, Australasia and much of the Old World.
Wikidata · Photo: JJ Harrison ( https://www.jjharrison.com.au/ ), CC BY-SA 3.0
26
Species of bird
A large bird of the stork family, Ciconiidae, with mostly white plumage and black on its wings.
27
Species of bird
Also called the European, Eurasian or Old World kestrel, a bird of prey among the kestrels of the falcon family, Falconidae. Because no other kestrel is common in the United Kingdom, it is usually called just the "kestrel" there.
Wikidata · Photo: Andreas Trepte, CC BY-SA 2.5
28
Species of bird
Once known as the fish hawk, river hawk or sea hawk, a bird of prey that eats fish, hunts by day and is found worldwide. A large raptor, it grows to over 60 cm (24 in) long, with a wingspan of 180 cm (71 in).
Wikidata · Photo: El Golli Mohamed, CC BY-SA 4.0
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29
Species of bird
Also called the northern sparrowhawk or just the sparrowhawk, a small bird of prey of the family Accipitridae. Adult males are bluish grey above and barred orange below; females and young birds are brown above and barred brown below.
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30
Species of bird
A large goose of Anatidae, the waterfowl family, and the species on which the genus Anser is based. Its plumage is grey and white, mottled and barred, and it has pink legs and an orange beak.
Wikidata · Photo: Imran Shah from Islamabad, Pakistan, CC BY-SA 2.0
Every Wikidata item that is a species of bird, and that has its own English Wikipedia article, ranked by the number of Wikimedia sites with a page about it — Wikipedia's language editions, mostly, and sister projects such as Wikiquote. That counts how many communities independently thought it worth describing, and nobody can buy a place on it. The top 30 are shown.
These belong on the list but Wikidata does not file them where the query looks:
Fetched from Wikidata on 2026-09-25. Each description is this site's summary of the entry's Wikipedia article, which its name links to: the wording is ours, the facts are Wikipedia's, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. To correct an entry, correct it there; the next refresh carries the change.
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