It’s not uncommon to see people online sharing adorable “axolotl” pictures or fascinating facts, only for the image to turn out to be something else entirely. For seasoned axolotl hobbyists, it’s usually easy to tell the difference. But if you’re new to the world of axolotls, things can get confusing. That’s because a handful of salamanders bear a striking resemblance to axolotls. With their feathery gills, wide heads, and aquatic habits—at least during certain stages of their lives—they can easily fool the untrained eye. To clear up the confusion, here are five salamanders that are most often mistaken for axolotls.
What Do Axolotls Look Like?
Axolotls are instantly recognizable amphibians with a unique appearance that sets them apart from other salamanders. They have elongated, flat bodies and wide heads that give them a distinctive smile-like expression.
One of their most striking features is their feathery external gills, which extend from either side of the head like soft, fringed plumes. These gills allow them to breathe underwater throughout their lives, a trait linked to their neoteny.
Axolotls have four short legs with slender toes, and a long, flat tail that makes them excellent swimmers.
Their skin can be various colors—wild types are mottled brown and green, while leucistic axolotls are pale pink or white with dark eyes. Others can be golden, black, or even speckled.
On average, axolotls grow between 6 and 12 inches long, with some reaching up to 18 inches in captivity.
1. Tiger Salamander Larvae
Tiger salamander larvae are probably the single most believable “axolotl look-alike.” In their larval stage, they have broad heads, chunky bodies, and three pairs of feathery external gills that wave as they swim, and their behavior (lurking in ponds, ambushing small invertebrates) looks axolotl-like to most observers.
The key difference is developmental: tiger salamander larvae normally metamorphose into terrestrial adults within months, losing their gills and developing lungs and terrestrial behaviors; only occasionally do individuals remain paedomorphic and retain gills as adults.
Also, tiger salamander larvae and adults are part of a widespread North American lineage and generally show patterning and colors (striping or blotches) that differ from the smoother, sometimes uniformly pale morphs hobbyists associate with pet axolotls.
If you find a gilled Ambystoma in a vernal pool and it starts to lose its gills and climb onto land as it ages, it’s almost certainly a tiger-salamander-type larva, not a lifelong axolotl.
2. Mudpuppies (Waterdogs)
Mudpuppies (often called waterdogs) can convincingly pass for axolotls because they are fully aquatic, keep large bushy external gills, and move slowly along the bottom of lakes and streams.
However, mudpuppies belong to a different family (Proteidae) and usually have a darker, mottled color pattern, a slimmer, more eel-like profile, and proportionally smaller eyes set into a broader, flatter head; many species also show a distinct stripe or blotching pattern down the side.
Size is another giveaway: mudpuppies commonly reach much larger sizes (many grow into the 8–19 inch / ~20–48 cm range), whereas most pet axolotls are usually under a foot long.
Geography helps too — mudpuppies are native to freshwater systems across much of eastern and central North America, while wild axolotls are native only to the high-altitude lakes and canals around Mexico City.
Finally, mudpuppies’ gill placement and the presence of two external gill slits behind each gill tuft (a family trait) can help an experienced observer separate them from Ambystoma axolotls.
3. Olm
The olm (Proteus anguinus) looks eerily like a pale, cave-adapted cousin of a leucistic axolotl: it is ghostly pale or pinkish, has external gills, and an almost otherworldly, slow-moving presence in cave pools.
But olms are obligate cave dwellers with a long, eel-like body plan, greatly reduced or nonfunctional eyes, and many specializations for life in total darkness (heightened smell and mechanoreception, slow metabolism, and astonishing longevity in captivity).
Unlike axolotls, which have a broader salamander silhouette and visible functioning eyes, olms are adapted to subterranean karst systems of Europe and show anatomical and behavioral traits (blindness and extreme troglomorphism) you won’t find in surface-dwelling Ambystoma.
If the animal you’re looking at has tiny or non-seeing eyes, unusually elongated body proportions, and was found in a cave stream or spring, it’s almost certainly an olm rather than an axolotl.
4. Newt Larvae
Newt larvae are perhaps the smallest, easiest-to-misidentify group on this list because many newt species hatch with feathery external gills and a fishy juvenile look that briefly resembles a baby axolotl.
At first glance a newt larva’s plumed gills and swimming behavior can trick an observer, especially when the specimen is small and photographed without scale.
The decisive differences are life history and size: newt larvae are typically much smaller, their gills are transient and are resorbed during metamorphosis when the animal shifts to a terrestrial or semi-terrestrial lifestyle, and most newt species reach adult forms that look quite different (slender, with distinct dorsal patterns and fully developed eyelids and lungs).
In short, if the gills are temporary and the animal later shows terrestrial behavior and form, you’re looking at a newt that was still in its larval phase — not an axolotl, which keeps its juvenile, gilled morphology into sexual maturity.
5. Hellbender
Hellbenders are often invoked by laypeople as “giant axolotls” because they’re large, flat-headed, fully aquatic salamanders, but that comparison is misleading: hellbenders lack the feathery external gills that define axolotls.
Instead, hellbenders use extensive folds of wrinkly skin along their flanks and throats for cutaneous gas exchange and have a body built for fast-flowing, oxygen-rich streams — they’re heavy-bodied, can exceed two feet in length, and spend much of their time walking or wedging themselves under rocks rather than hovering like a gilled salamander.
Their ecology (riverine habitats with strong currents), enormous size, and different respiratory anatomy (cutaneous respiration via skin folds rather than external gill filaments) are reliable clues that an observer is seeing a hellbender, not an axolotl.
Because hellbenders and axolotls occupy very different habitats and show such distinct respiratory anatomy, mistaking one for the other usually happens only in casual conversation rather than careful identification.