Feeding a Betta or a Goldfish: Flakes, Pellets or Frozen Food?
Published by Planète Pets · managing editor: Clément Lacaille · how our guides are written
Overfeeding is, by a wide margin, the beginner's number one mistake: it pollutes the water far more reliably than it nourishes the fish. Yet bettas and goldfish have very different needs, and confusing the two leads straight to digestive trouble. Here's how to feed each one properly.
Contents · 5 sections
The betta: a demanding carnivore
The Siamese fighting fish (Betta splendens) is an insectivorous carnivore. Its ideal staple diet: betta-specific pellets, rich in animal protein and sized for its small mouth. A pot lasts several months and costs 4 to 9 €. Supplement once or twice a week with frozen food (bloodworms, brine shrimp, daphnia), sold in blister packs of cubes for around 3 to 6 €. Standard community flakes are too low in protein for this fish.
- Portion: 3 to 5 pellets, once or twice a day.
- Fasting: one day a week, beneficial for its digestion.
- Always thaw the cubes in a little tank water before feeding.
The goldfish: a greedy omnivore
The goldfish eats anything, all the time — and that's precisely the problem: it begs even when full. Choose sinking pellets formulated for goldfish (5 to 12 € a pot) rather than flakes: when gulping flakes at the surface, it swallows air, which encourages swim bladder disorders. Add blanched vegetables (courgette, skinned mashed peas) once or twice a week, plus the occasional frozen treat.
Flakes, pellets or frozen: which to choose?
- Flakes: practical and cheap, but they break down quickly and pollute if you're heavy-handed. Fine for a varied community tank.
- Pellets: precise dosing, better stability in water, species-specific formulas. Our default choice. Tetra, JBL and other brands offer complete species-specific ranges.
- Frozen food: the closest thing to a natural diet, perfect as a weekly supplement. Requires a corner of your freezer.
The golden rule of portioning
Feed only what is eaten within two to three minutes. Anything that sinks to the bottom decomposes and degrades water quality: if you overfeed, your nitrite and nitrate tests will soon remind you. An automatic feeder (15 to 35 €) can cover absences of a few days, but know that a healthy adult fish fasts through a weekend without any difficulty.
Going further
Good food never makes up for an unsuitable tank: the goldfish needs volume, as our guide to choosing your first aquarium explains. Find all our food selections in the Planète Pets fish food section.
In our shop, for this use: Programmable automatic aquarium fish feeder (€32.90) · the whole shop
This guide is part of Planète Pets’s Fishkeeping universe. Our advice is general in nature: for any health concern, your veterinarian remains the only reference.