Emission
The dolphin squeezes air through its nasal passages, vibrating phonic lips to launch a tight beam of clicks forward.
Lesson series
Echolocation
Follow guided lessons to uncover how dolphins map their world with bursts of sound, quick echoes, and finely tuned listening skills.
Sound in action
How echolocation works
Dolphins turn sound into a 3-step investigation that lets them map the world even when their eyes can't see clearly.
-
-
Travel
Those clicks race through the water, bounce off fish, rocks, or friends, and return as faint echoes carrying shape and distance clues.
-
Interpretation
Specialized ear bones funnel the echoes to the brain, where milliseconds-long delays are decoded into a full 3D mental picture.
Quick facts for discussion
- Clicks can reach over 200 decibels at the source—loud, but safe underwater.
- Dolphins can send up to 1,000 clicks per second when they zero in on a target.
- Echoes return in under 100 milliseconds, faster than a human eye blink.