The Best Food for Mollies in 2022

Small fishes, like mollies, tetras, danios, and guppies, may look tiny but they are quite voracious eaters. They are constantly darting back and forth in the water, so they build up quite an appetite. You have to feed them with the best food for mollies once or twice a day, so they will have enough energy for their daily activities.

Normies in aquarium keeping would think that the food is okay if the fish can fit it inside their mouths. However, the size of the pellets is just one of the many different details you need to consider. If you want your community tank to thrive and your fish to look as colorful and vibrant as possible, they will need the best fish food for mollies.

This article will teach you the differences between quality fish food, and other products that are not quite as good. You will be receiving a couple of product recommendations for fish food as well as a short buying guide that might help you figure out which product is worth your time and money.

Best Food for Mollies Revies

1. Hikari Fish mollies Food

Hikari is well-known for producing some of the best quality fish food in the market, and this product is one of the best foods for mollies and guppies. This fish food is slow-sinking. In other words, it will float on the surface for a while.

After that, it will slowly sink to the bottom. I like this quality because it gives all the fish enough time to feed. Even the bottom feeders can have their share.

Despite the fact that mollies do not grow beyond an inch in size, they still need a lot of protein in their diet and that is just what they can get from this product and in huge amounts to boot. This fish food’s main ingredient is fish meal, which is an excellent source of protein.

In addition, it also contains plant-based protein. I keep a couple of livebearers in my aquarium and they absolutely like this molly baby fish food. The fry that eventually comes out loves it, too. In addition to being growth boosters, this fish food also contains a lot of color enhancers.

Aside from mollies, I also have a couple of neon-colored tetras. After just a couple of weeks of eating this fish food, their colors became so vibrant, you could swear they glow in the dark. If you want an aquarium bursting with color, feed your fish with this product.

Unlike fish flakes, you should avoid crushing these pellets, unless you will be feeding them to fry. These pellets are just the right size for small fish breeds. I have used pellets that were too big that they would just settle at the bottom and cloud the water.

Another nice thing about this fish food is that it does not disintegrate as quickly as other brands. This results in the water always being clear.

What I do not like that much about this product is that it contains quite a lot of extender ingredients. This is not that much of an issue since they help keep the pellets together, but at its price, there should not be that many extenders. I know that it is subjective, but because this is a bit pricey, I believe that it should have more quality ingredients.

2. TetraMin Balanced Tropical Flake Food

Despite being marketed for tropical fish, this product is still suitable for freshwater fish as well. I have been feeding my mollies with this food for a couple of months and they have been quite healthy. Their colors have never been brighter and all of them are full of energy. If you’re worried that this would have negative effects on your fish, it won’t.

I keep a couple of 30-gallon tanks, and I don’t have much of a budget for fish food. This product provides good value for money, which is why it is one of my favorites. First, the price is quite reasonable.

Second, you will also be getting a large tub of fish food flakes. Since I have mostly small fish breeds in my tanks, nothing more than three inches, a single tub of this product can last at least two months.

This product is also ideal for mollies because this flaked food floats on the surface of the water. Mollies are mostly surface feeders, so they absolutely like this food. Also, after a couple of minutes, this fish food will start to sink, but not too quickly.

The flakes would stay suspended for a while in the middle of the tank. This makes it possible for the middle-feeding fish, like tetras and angelfish, to reach them.

Although this is not as nutrient-rich as the other, more expensive fish food brands, it still contains enough nutrients to keep your fish healthy. This fish food has balanced amounts of vitamins and minerals that fulfill the daily nutritional requirements. So, even though it is not quite as nutritious, this fish food is far from useless.

Although I do like this product, it does need improvements in certain areas. One thing that needs improvement is its flavor. I did not taste it personally but some of the picky eaters in my tanks took a while before they would even try eating this food.

I have tried other food brands, and some of them triggered a feeding frenzy, so their flavor might have been much better.

3. Fluval Bug Bites Bottom Feeder Fish Food

Unlike other products, Fluval Bug Bites contains real black soldier fly larvae. Pound-for-pound, this ingredient contains more protein than even beef. What this means is that your fish can grow larger than they typically would. They will also be better at healing themselves from injuries and sicknesses.

Although mollies do not typically grow beyond 5 inches (including the fins), feeding them with protein-rich food will help them achieve their maximum size early.

This fish food, though, tends to crumble a bit when it hits the water, like homemade molly fish food. Fortunately, the crumbled pieces are not so fine that they would cloud the water. Besides, the mollies, danios, and tetras prefer that these pellets break apart as it makes them easier to swallow.

Aside from that, this fish food seems to be so tasty that it will often send the fish in my tank into a frenzy. Every pellet I drop into the tank is gone within seconds. This is why it would have been better if this product came in a larger container.

This product also comes formulated specifically to be easy to break down and digest. In other words, it is okay to break down almost all components of this fish food, turn them into nutrients, and immediately get absorbed into the fishes’ bodies.

This also makes the digestive system of the mollies so efficient that it almost halves the amount of waste that they produce. As a result, the ammonia and nitrate levels in my aquarium are always zero if not barely minimal.

Aside from protein, this product also contains a lot of Omega 3 and 6 fatty acids due to one of the ingredients being salmon meat. The Omega 3 and 6 fatty acids are responsible for keeping your fishes’ scales and skin healthy and bright.

In addition, they help brighten up their colors quite a bit. These nutrients also bolster the immune system of mollies, making them more able to resist illnesses.

I don’t have that much to complain about regarding the quality of this product, but I do kind of wish that it came in a bigger container. The small 1.6 oz jar goes fast in my household since I have three tanks.

Even if I feed this to my fish once or twice a week, which is the ideal molly fish feeding schedule, the entire jar is gone after a month. This might be a bit more economical if it came in a bigger jar since it will not be using as much packaging.

4. Aqueon Tropical Granules

If you want your mollies, and essentially all of the fish in your tank, to have bright colors and shiny skin and scales, you will love this product. It contains spirulina and astaxanthin, the ingredients that greatly enhance the colors of fish.

I was quite surprised at how colorful my mollies have become. They even got a tinge of red now that they did not have before.

Aside from color-enhancing ingredients, this product also contains an abundance of protein. Most of the protein contained in this fish food came from different sources, namely herring, krill, and squid meal.

In addition to being excellent sources of protein, they are also easier to absorb into the fishes’ bodies. I have been using these for nearly half a year, and I have noticed how much faster my fish have been growing ever since I switched to this brand.

Unlike dogs and cats, fish are colorblind, so their food must be brightly colored so that they can see it easily. In addition, fish associate bright colors with the quality of the food. It would be like how humans judge food based on how good it looks.

Although the pellets have vibrant colors, they are not artificial, making them safe for your fish to eat.

Not only do these pellets look good but they are also apparently pretty tasty. Whenever it is feeding time, all the fish in the tank would come out of their hiding places. Even the seemingly docile fish would join the small feeding frenzy.

I have a couple of danios that usually do not swim with the other fish. However, I noticed that they will join the group when it is feeding time.

As much as I do love this product, it does have a couple of issues. One is that it sinks much too slow. Some of my fish are middle feeders so they would wait until the food sinks a bit before they join the feeding frenzy.

In addition, these pellets are a bit too large for smaller fish like the tetras and danios, so I have to crush a couple of the pellets for them.

5. API Tropical PELLETS Sinking Fish Food

Although the label states that this is for tropical fish, I have been feeding these to my mollies and they seem fine. They look a lot healthier than they did before I made the switch to this product. If you have saltwater and freshwater aquariums, it would be perfectly fine to use this product on both.

This fish food contains all the necessary nutrients that your fish needs to thrive like they would in the wild. This product contains spirulina, which is a superfood with plenty of antioxidants.

Also, spirulina helps improve the health and appearance of the fish’s scales and skin. I have been feeding this food to my mollies and their colors are now much brighter than they were before. There are even a couple of splashes of color that were not there before I used this fish food.

Included in the nutrient content of this product is an abundance of proteins. Your mollies, even though they don’t grow quite as big as other aquarium fish, still need a lot of protein for proper development.

If you have young fish, I recommend feeding them with this fish food as this could help them grow faster. My mollies are just barely three weeks old and they are already the size of adults.

This fish food comes formulated in a way that makes it easy to break down and digest. Because most of this fish food is absorbed into the bodies of the fish, they will produce a lot less waste than before. I usually do partial water changes every week to keep the ammonia level low. However, since feeding my fish with this product, the amount of ammonia in the tank is always low to zero. This means less frequent water changes.

What I do not like about this fish food is that they are quite brittle. A couple of pellets left in the tank will cause the water to go cloudy. You will need to watch how many of these pellets you place in your tank. Never put more than what your fish can eat within five minutes. If there are leftovers, you need to fish them out immediately.

6. Omega One Freeze Dried Blood Worms

Compared to regular fish food, blood worms (specifically the larvae) are chock-full of protein. So much that many fish breeders use them for conditioning their stock before entering the breeding season. I like feeding this to my fish fry once their mouths are big enough to eat, and I have never seen such staggering growth rates ever.

A lot of aquarium keepers try to avoid blood worm larvae because some of them carry harmful parasites. This is the reason why I never use live blood worms unless they came from a trusted source.

On the other hand, these are freeze-dried bloodworm larvae, so you are getting the same nutrients as live ones. However, the freeze-drying process makes the larvae much safer to consume because it kills any harmful bacteria and parasites. After almost a year of using this product, I have yet to see any adverse effects on my fish.

The freeze-drying process zaps away almost all of the moisture in the blood worms. This means they can last for a very long time even without refrigeration. This is as long as you keep the opened jar somewhere cool and dry.

Avoid placing it in your aquarium cabinet with the sump. I try to make this food last for as long as possible, and so far, I have managed to make one bottle last up to 3 months.

The best thing about it is that fish cannot get enough of it. As soon as it hits the water, all my fish would start to swarm and get into a feeding frenzy. Even the bottom dwellers would come out and grab the bits that reach the bottom if there are any. However, although your fish may love this food, it is not wise to feed it to them every day.

The reason why you should not feed blood worms to your fish too often is that they mainly consist of just protein and not much else. Your fish will not be getting all the right nutrients that they will need to thrive and remain healthy.

In addition, putting your fish on a mostly-protein molly fish diet will lead to them having severe constipation. Also, in the case of this particular product, I only use this as a treat sometimes for my fish because it is expensive.

What to Look For When Buying a Food for Mollies

Do your mollies need specific food to stay healthy? Not necessarily. Although some brands provide fish food that they claim is best for mollies, many other choices provide the same results. To help you figure out which foods you should feed your fish, here are some pointers:

Protein Content

Although mollies do not grow beyond four inches most of the time, they will still need a lot of protein, especially when they are still young. A juvenile fish needs a lot of protein because it is at the stage of rapid growth.

Feeding your fish at this stage with a lot of protein will allow them to reach their full growth potential after just a month or so.

The products that provide the most protein are freeze-dried worms and larvae. However, there are also some pellets and flakes that contain a considerable amount of protein. Check the ingredients list to make sure you’re getting the right one.

Color-Enhancing Ingredients

Although your fish will undoubtedly look much better when they are healthy, you can further improve their appearance. You can do that by feeding them foods that contain color-enhancing ingredients.

Some of the ingredients you should look out for include spirulina, which is a superfood that also provides many other health benefits. Astaxanthin is also another ingredient that will enhance the colors of your fish, particularly the reds and oranges.

Size

Mollies are quite small fish, so it does not do them any favors to feed them with pellets or wafers that are too big for them to eat. You should get fish food that is small enough that they can swallow whole without any risk of choking.

Does not Cloud the Water

No one likes doing water changes, especially if they need to do it more than once a week due to the food clouding the water. I have had the displeasure of having to use a brand of fish food that immediately disintegrates in the water and makes the water cloudy every molly fish feeding time.

I hated that I had to change the water every couple of weeks. Choose a brand of fish food that is firm enough that it won’t turn to much while your fish are still feeding.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can Mollies eat Tropical Fish Food?

Most of the time, you can feed tropical fish food to freshwater fish, unless the instructions specifically tell you not to. However, since mollies in the wild would sometimes live in brackish water, feeding them with tropical fish food will not be an issue.

Can Mollies eat Goldfish Food?

Unless you crush the pellets a bit, mollies won’t be able to fit the goldfish food inside their mouths.

Conclusion

Mollies are some of the most beautiful freshwater fish that you can keep as pets. They are also low-maintenance, so they are ideal for beginners. However, just because they are hardy little fish, that does not mean you can feed them with whatever kind of fish food you have on hand.

To bring out the true beauty of your mollies, you will need to give them the best food for mollies. If you are impressed with how they look now, prepare yourself after a month or so of eating highly-nutritious food.