Swift tern

Weight

295.9 g – 334.5 g

Length

Not recorded

Lifespan

20.3 years

Diet

Aquatic predator

Main food

Not recorded

Habitat

coastal

Egg incubation

27.5 days

Young per litter or clutch

1

Age at maturity

23.9 months

Litters or clutches a year

1

Lifestyle

Aerial

Migration

Migratory

Conservation status

Not recorded

Countries on record

1 countrysrc for Countries on record

The swift tern is listed for 1 country.

The same countries as a list

1. Australia

No conservation assessment is recorded for this species in our sources. That is not the same as being safe: it has not been matched to an assessment.

1. kingdomAnimalia
2. phylumChordata
3. classAves
4. orderCharadriiformes
5. familyLaridae
6. genusThalasseus
7. SpeciesThalasseus bergii (M. H. K. Lichtenstein, 1823)

Synonyms Sterna bergii, Thalasseus bergii, Thalasseus bergii bergii

Catalogue of Life

LC, Least Concern

Sandwich tern

Thalasseus sandvicensis

Laridae

L

Lesser crested tern

Thalasseus bengalensis

LaridaeNo free photo yet

S

Sea gull

Thalasseus maximus

LaridaeNo free photo yet

C

Chinese crested tern

Thalasseus bernsteini

LaridaeNo free photo yet

E

Elegant tern

Thalasseus elegans

LaridaeNo free photo yet

C

Cabot's tern

Thalasseus acuflavidus

LaridaeNo free photo yet

CompareSwift tern vs Sandwich ternSwift tern vs Lesser crested ternSwift tern vs Sea gullSwift tern vs Chinese crested tern

• An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles · CC0 1.0 · E096-269
  Myhrvold, N.P., Baldridge, E., Chan, B., Sivam, D., Freeman, D.L. & Ernest, S.K.M. (2015) An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles. Ecology 96: 3109. https://doi.org/10.1890/15-0846R.1. Data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.3563457.v1
• AmphiBIO, a global database for amphibian ecological traits · CC BY 4.0 · v1
  Oliveira, B.F., São-Pedro, V.A., Santos-Barrera, G., Penone, C. & Costa, G.C. (2017) AmphiBIO, a global database for amphibian ecological traits. Scientific Data 4: 170123. https://doi.org/10.1038/sdata.2017.123. Data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.4644424.v5
• AVONET: morphological, ecological and geographical data for all birds · CC BY 4.0 · v7
  Tobias, J.A. et al. (2022) AVONET: morphological, ecological and geographical data for all birds. Ecology Letters 25: 581–597. https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.13898. Data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.16586228.v7
• Catalogue of Life eXtended Release · CC BY 4.0 · 2026-10-16 XR
  Catalogue of Life (2026). Catalogue of Life eXtended Release, version 2026-10-16 XR. Catalogue of Life Foundation, Amsterdam, Netherlands. https://doi.org/10.48580/dgzlf
• Wikimedia Commons · per file (CC0 / public domain / CC BY green, CC BY-SA amber, anything else not displayed) · 2026-11-11
  Wikimedia Commons contributors. Wikimedia Commons. https://commons.wikimedia.org (each file credited to its author under its own licence).
• EltonTraits 1.0: species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals · CC0 1.0 · 1.0
  Wilman, H., Belmaker, J., Simpson, J., de la Rosa, C., Rivadeneira, M.M. & Jetz, W. (2014) EltonTraits 1.0: Species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals. Ecology 95: 2027. https://doi.org/10.1890/13-1917.1. Data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.3559887.v1
• Wikidata · CC0 1.0 · 2026-11-11
  Wikidata contributors. Wikidata. https://www.wikidata.org (data retrieved via the Wikidata Query Service).
• Wikipedia (English) · CC BY-SA 4.0 · 2026-11-11
  Wikipedia contributors. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. https://en.wikipedia.org (text under CC BY-SA 4.0; each block names its article and revision).

@misc{swift_tern_2026,
  title = {Swift tern (Thalasseus bergii)},
  author = {{CreatureData}},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://creaturedata.com/animals/swift-tern},
  note = {Data as of 2026-11-11}
}