| Named By: | Ted Daeschler, Neil Shubin & Farish Jenkins in 2006 |
| Time Period: | Late Devonian, 375 Ma |
| Location: | Canada, Nunavut, Ellesmere island |
| Size: | Certainly over 1 meter long. Some isolated remains suggest a size of up to 2 meters long |
| Diet: | Carnivore |
| Fossil(s): | Several specimens |
| Classification: | | Chordata | Sarcopterygii | Tetrapodomorpha | |
Tiktaalik is a monospecific genus of extinct sarcopterygian (lobe-finned fish) from the late Devonian period, about 375 MYA (million years ago), having many features akin to those of tetrapods (four-legged animals).
Tiktaalik has a possibility of being a representative of the evolutionary transition from fish to amphibians. It is an example from several lines of ancient sarcopterygian fish developing adaptations to the oxygen-poor shallow-water habitats of its time, environmental conditions which are thought to have led to the evolution of tetrapods.
It and similar animals may possibly be the common ancestors of the broad swath of all vertebrate terrestrial fauna: amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals. The first well-preserved Tiktaalik fossils were found in 2004 on Ellesmere Island in Nunavut, Canada.