One of the questions new fish keepers may have is can you train a betta fish?
The answer is yes, with the most prominent being the Betta, Oscars, Parrot Cichlids, the Goldfish and more.
Training your Betta can be a fun experience for yourself and children! And for the most part pretty easy to do.
Many betta owners have trained their betta to follow their finger, eat from their hand, swim through hoops and jump out of the water.
There are so many tricks you can teach them it’s crazy! Betta Fish are very responsive and interactive fish, once you learn to communicate with them.
In short, using simple positive reinforcement is the most effective way to train your fish quickly.
In this post I go over the methods and reasons why things work and even give you a trick to try out, here’s what you’ll learn:
Contents
Tasty Food For Training Betta Fish
Betta fish food is used as reinforcement to reward your fish for performing the desired activity.
Image | Title | Prime | Buy |
---|---|---|---|
Top![]() | Fluval Bug Bites Betta with Shrimp for Fish, 1.09 oz. | PrimeEligible | Buy On Amazon |
![]() | Tetra BloodWorms 0.28 Ounce, Freeze-Dried Food For Freshwater and Saltwater Fish, 0.28-Ounce, 100-Ml | PrimeEligible | Buy On Amazon |
![]() | New Life Spectrum Betta Small 25g (Naturox Series) | PrimeEligible | Buy On Amazon |
![]() | OMEGA One Freeze Dried Bloodworm .96oz, Yellow | PrimeEligible | Buy On Amazon |
![]() | Tetra 77019 Betta Floating Mini Pellets for Bettas, 1.02 oz | PrimeEligible | Buy On Amazon |
![]() | Ocean Nutrition Atison's Betta Food, 75 g | PrimeEligible | Buy On Amazon |
Training a Betta fish sounds intimidating and unbelievable at first. So where do you begin when you want to start training.
Well, before you can start training you should understand the different methods used to train a betta fish.
Can You Train Betta Fish
Yes, you absolutely can in fact there are many tricks to teach Betta fish if you know the right methods.
Betta Fish Training methods:
The easiest and most effective way to train your fish quickly, as noted above is by using food as a way to positively reinforce your desired activity.
By repetition, your betta fish will eventually associate the food with the desired trick and/or action.
Once this occurs it will become easier to teach your fish more complicated tricks.
How to Train Betta Fish?
If you would like to learn how to teach your betta fish tricks take a look at this product.
R2 Betta training kit available on Amazon.
The kit comes with everything you need to train any fish, I’m not joking here are a few videos of goldfish named Albert:
Albert holds the Guinness World Record for the “Fish with the largest repertoire of tricks.”
Albert was trained using the techniques in the R2 fish school complete fish training kit. The R2 Fish School is a complete fish training kit, everything you need to teach your Betta fish is included in this package.
A Few Tricks To Teach Your Betta Fish
Here is a list of a few fun Betta tricks they can learn very easily in about a week using the fighter fish training kit.
- How to train a betta fish to jump
- How to teach your betta fish to play soccer
- How to train betta fish to jump
- How to train a betta fish to follow your finger
- How to train your betta fish to eat from your hand
Betta Fish Doing Tricks

One of the easier tricks to teach a Betta fish is to teach your betta to jump out of water.
Bettas tend to do this naturally in the wild as they attack food on the water surface. So you just have to tap into their natural instinct.
- Place a pellet under your fingernail or try putting some water on your finger and place the pellet on the water – it should stick.
- Wiggle your finger just above your water to get your Betta’s attention. Your Betta may jump at your finger. If the Betta jumps reward it with the pellet. Sometimes Betta’s are not interested right away, keep trying and be patient. Wait for your Betta to become interested, you may have to stick the tip of the pellet n the water and wait for the Betta to touch your finger or the pellet. When they do reward them with the pellet. After a few days of doing this, raise your finger with the pellet above the water and repeat step 2.
- If your Betta jumps, they will continue to do this as long as they get a reward. Keep practicing but don’t do it too often, you should never overfeed your Betta. Try not to exceed your daily pellet maximum. Remember to practice a few times a day to keep things fresh.
- Congratulations you trained a fish. For a challenge, try raising your finger higher from the water’s surface.
Questions about Betta fish training:
Don’t fish have a 3-second memory? This is a myth. In order to survive in the wild Betta fish would require a capable memory. Fish can swim through mazes, identify color, food types, sounds, etc…
Can my Betta fish learn tricks? Of course, A Betta can be trained using positive reinforcement as described above. The first step is getting your Betta to associate food with reward. Once this association occurs you gradually build upon previous skills and tricks towards more advanced tricks.
How do I train my Betta in a community tank? For training it’s best to isolate the fish you would like to train. Either by using a divider or a separate tank.
How fast will my Betta learn a trick? By practicing every day approximately 10-15 minutes at each feeding your Betta should learn most tricks within a week.
How difficult is it to train a Betta? Training your Betta is very easy and takes very little time. Kids and family members will enjoy seeing your Betta learn new tricks.
However, if you are really serious about training your betta fish some crazy tricks like the ones in the videos above, we strongly recommend the R2 fish training kit as the best place to begin because it has proven success.
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