10 Best Goldfish Foods You Need to Try

Over the years, hundreds of generations have been breeding goldfish to be able to display unique characteristics like double tails and egg-shaped body shapes. This compact body can cause constipation or digestive problems. Goldfish owners spend a lot of energy and time finding the best food for their water piggies. Here are the top 10 foods we love to feed our goldfish after decades of keeping and raising them.

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. In our years of experience, we regularly feed floating foods and have not seen any health issues with our fish. 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

If you’re looking a professional-grade, goldfish-specific prepared food to feed every day, then Saki-Hikari Fancy Goldfish is the brand we recommend. This 3 mm sinking pellet is loaded with beneficial probiotics, wheat germ, and seaweed to improve digestion and support intestinal flora. Astaxanthin, spirulina and other color-enhancing ingredients can help boost the red color of your fish’s goldfish, without muddying its white areas. These pellets also contain Vitamin E and Vitamin C to help strengthen your fish’s immunity against disease. It’s no wonder that people have fallen in love with the Saki-Hikari line of specialized foods for goldfish.

2. Vegetables

While single-tailed goldfish have streamlined, torpedo-shaped physiques, double-tailed goldfish have balloon-shaped builds that can be prone to blockage, bloating, and swim bladder disease. Many owners add vegetables to their fish’s meals as a preventative measure. We prefer canned green beans, zucchini slices and canned carrot slices. Leafy vegetables such as lettuce and spinach are also good options. You may need to blanch the vegetable first, by boiling it briefly in water until it becomes soft enough to eat by the fish. Unshelled peas can be used to treat constipation problems. However, they can be messy and labor-intensive to maintain.

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 are a very high-quality, clean food that does not quickly disintegrate in water, allowing your goldfish to forage throughout the day and find leftover pieces on the tank bottom. Sold at most local pet and fish stores, they often come in packages of individually foil-sealed cubes or frozen slabs that you can break off into smaller chunks. We love krill, daphnia and spirulina salt shrimp as frozen foods for goldfish. Much like fiber, the exoskeletons on these crustaceans are not typically digested and thus help to flush out the fish’s bowels and keep things moving smoothly.

4. Hikari Cichlid Excel

Freshwater herbivores and African cichlids, for example, also require plant-rich diets in order 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

Are you looking for a food that’s not a pellet and is goldfish-specific? Repashy worked closely with experts in goldfish nutrition to create a premium gel food that uses the most effective ingredients. 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. For easy instructions on how you can make Repashy instant food gel food in under 10 minutes, read this article.

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. The special recipe includes krill, shrimps, squid, and even spirulina alga. They also contain important nutrients, vitamins and minerals to ensure a healthy diet and natural color enhancement. Xtreme fish foods are all made in the USA, and depending on the size of your goldfish, you can choose between their 1.5mm Floating Pellets, 1.5mm Slow-Sinking Pellets, and 3mm Big Fella Pellets.

7. Hikari Gold

Have you ever wondered how goldfish are related to koi? These distant cousins were created originally from carp in East Asia. Therefore, consider bringing in Hikari Gold koi food into your goldfish’s meal schedule. This floating pellet of high quality is made for cold water fish. It has easy-to-digest ingredients and can pass through the body quickly even in cooler temperatures. The food is specifically formulated to provide excellent health and prevent fat accumulation. These pellets are a great option for anyone looking for a low-cost, healthy diet that will encourage the best growth of their goldfish.

8. Xtreme Spirulina Flake

Spirulina is a type of blue-green algae (or cyanobacteria) that is widely used as a food source for humans, poultry, livestock, and fish. It naturally contains protein, iron and beta carotene as well as vitamins and fatty acid. 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. Hikari algae wafers, which contain an excellent mix of vegetables and proteins, are great for those who prefer sinking food.

9. Hikari Blood Red Parrot+

The majority of foods on this list focus on providing good fiber, roughage, and other nutrients. But what if you want your goldfish display the most stunning colors? Hikari invented a floating pellet to enhance the coloration in blood parrot cichlids. We’ve also found that it works well with goldfish. This recipe has a variety of natural color-enhancing components, such as chili peppers, phaffia wheat, marigold flowers, canthaxanthin and lutein. It also contains beneficial probiotics that promote healthy growth and help with digestion. For the ultimate boost in color, add Hikari Red Parrot+ to your fish’s weekly food rotation.

10. Algae and plants left over

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.