There are many things you can do with a 5 gallon starter desktop aquarium. There are no shortage of the varieties of fish you can keep even in such a small aquarium as long as you’re aware of their needs. When it comes to keeping fish, beginners are often told that it is better to start with a medium sized tank such as 50 gallons, etc. No doubt this is a great way to get serious with fish keeping, but having a small tank can be equally educational and rewarding when treated with proper respect and care. There are many great advice and suggestions you can get from reading online but they can generally be summed up as follows.

A single feature fish

Given the size of the tank and the experience of the owner, stocking a single feature fish is a great idea. All your focus and attention are on that single fish, which increases its chance of survival. The key is to choose a fish that is hardy, less demanding, but interesting and beautiful enough to warrant all that attention.

The most popular suggestion is to stock a single male betta (betta splendens), also known as the Siamese fighting fish. Males are more colorful and have longer fins. These fish are beautiful to look at with their flowy and delicate fins. They’re actually quite hardy, which makes them easier to care for. Their name also gives a clue as to why you don’t want put more than 1 or 2 in the same tank. Put in a plant for them as a hiding place but don’t use fake plastic plants as it can tear their delicate fins. They’ve been known to jump so if you have a lidless aquarium, make sure the water is not filled to the top. A very gorgeous and elegant fish to look at and easy to care for.

A small group of fish

If you want slightly more movement in the tank, you can instead stock 4-5 male Endler’s Livebearers (poecilia wingei). Closely related to the guppy, they are small but with bright neon colors. Don’t mix males and females unless you want them to breed, and they do breed fast. As with the betta, they are quite hardy and undemanding, but needs hard and warm water, around 66 to 82 degrees F. They do very well when kept in tanks with either live or fake plants as their hiding places.

Invertebrates are good companions

Adding more fish beyond that will significantly increase the bioload of the tank and make it difficult to keep them healthy, but you can consider adding invertebrates. Do note that that can be considered as snacks for the fish, but given some hiding places, they can peacefully coexist. Small shrimps such as ghost shrimps (palaemenetes paludosus), cherry shrimps (neocaridina heteropoda), or crystal red shrimps (caridina cf. cantonensis) are excellent additions as they’re brightly colored and live at the bottom of the tank. They are interesting to look at and give your small tank some diversity as well. Some enjoy looking at shrimps so much that they dedicate an entire tank to shrimps only. You may also add snails such as spixi or apple snails, as they are algae eaters which actually helps to keep your tank clean.

Why stop at here once you’re there?

Once you are able to maintain a simple fish tank like this, nothing will stop you from starting another desktop aquarium project with different varieties of fish. The more experienced keepers might tackle more challenging projects such as keeping a dwarf puffer (carinotetraodon travancoricus), or starting a nano reef tank. Whichever it is, one thing is for sure: you started this new hobby with a 5 gallon starter desktop aquarium.