Food guide
What should I feed my fish?
Ten foods, three stats. Hunger keeps your fish from starving, health heals it up, and friendship (the affection bar) makes it worth more when you sell. Here's every number.
| Food | Cost | Hunger | Health | Friendship |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 Fish Food | 5 | +200 | 0 | 0 |
 Orange | 20 | +100 | +100 | +40 |
 Carrot | 25 | +250 | 0 | +30 |
 Tomato | 25 | 0 | +200 | +30 |
 Banana | 65 | +200 | +100 | +100 |
 Cherry | 75 | +500 | +100 | +50 |
 Grape | 75 | +150 | +150 | +100 |
 Apple | 100 | +100 | +1000 | +10 |
 Lemon | 100 | +300 | -50 | +150 |
 Chili | 100 | +1000 | -100 | +250 |
Numbers are the game's internal units from version 1.4. A baby fish has 3,000 hunger and 1,000 health to start with, so a single apple fully heals one.
Which food is best?
Depends what you're after. Here's how we'd think about it.
Just keeping them fed
Fish Food is 5 coins for 200 hunger, which is the cheapest hunger in the game by a mile. It does nothing for health or friendship though. Carrot is a decent step up at 25 coins for 250 hunger and a bit of friendship. If you need a big top up in one go, a Cherry gives 500 hunger for 75.
Healing a sick fish
Apple. It's 100 coins and restores 1,000 health, which is more than everything else put together. Tomato is the budget pick at 25 coins for 200 health, but it doesn't fill them up at all.
Building friendship fast
Friendship is what makes a fish worth selling, so this is where the money is. For the most friendship per coin, the best picks are:
- Chili: 250 friendship for 100 coins
- Orange: 40 friendship for 20 coins
- Banana: 100 friendship for 65 coins
- Lemon: 150 friendship for 100 coins
Chili is the big one. It's also the spiciest, which is the polite way of saying it takes 100 health off. Lemon takes 50. Follow either one with an apple or a tomato if your fish is already looking rough, and don't spam chilis on a baby.
The Color Changer
If you own the Color Changer, its color is a blend of the last ten things it ate. Feed it grapes for a while and it drifts green. Cherries pull it red, lemons and bananas push it yellow. Yes, you can absolutely pick food by outfit.
New to the game? Start with the how to play guide, or see every fish you can buy.