Yangchuanosaurus | Dino Directory
Natural History Museum, London
Reviewed: 9/8/2026
General authoritative overview of Yangchuanosaurus covering its size, body form, age, diet and Chinese provenance.
Open source
Yangchuanosaurus shangyouensis
Yangchuanosaurus was a large, two-legged predatory dinosaur from the Late Jurassic of China. Its skull was deep and powerfully built, lightened by large openings on the side, and along the midline of the snout it carried a low, rugose bony ridge.
Yangchuanosaurus
Yangchuanosaurus shangyouensis
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Weight
1500–3400 kg
Length
8–10.8 m
Diet
Carnivore
Period
Jurassic
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1500–3400 kg
8–10.8 m
Jurassic
Bipedal
2.4–3.2 m
30 km/h
Carnivore
2 recorded fossil finds in China. First described in 1978 by Dong et al..
Sites and counts from the Paleobiology Database
The timeline shows the whole age of dinosaurs – and how much time has passed since. The glowing part is when Yangchuanosaurus lived.
million years ago
Lived 161–155 million years ago
If the whole age of dinosaurs were a single day, Yangchuanosaurus lived at 12:07.
Chapter • Meet the dinosaur
Yangchuanosaurus was a large, two-legged predatory dinosaur from the Late Jurassic of China. Its skull was deep and powerfully built, lightened by large openings on the side, and along the midline of the snout it carried a low, rugose bony ridge. The jaws held recurved, serrated blade-like teeth suited to slicing flesh and tendon. The arms were short but muscular and ended in three clawed fingers, while the hind limbs were long and heavily muscled. A long, stiffened tail acted as a counterweight, giving the animal a fully horizontal posture with the tail carried clear of the ground.
Chapter • Where it lived
Yangchuanosaurus lived roughly 161–155 million years ago in what is now the Sichuan Basin of southern China. Its fossils come from the Shangshaximiao Formation, laid down in a warm, seasonally wet inland landscape of meandering rivers, lakes, floodplains and forests of conifers, ginkgos, cycads and ferns. The type specimen came from the dam site at Yongchuan, and further material from the same formation has been recovered near Zigong, home to the Dashanpu quarry and its famous Jurassic dinosaur fauna.
Chapter • Wild behavior
Cathemeral
There is no direct evidence of group living in Yangchuanosaurus: no trackways and no bone beds containing several individuals are known. Researchers therefore assume it hunted alone or in loose, temporary associations, as is generally inferred for other large theropods. Several animals gathering at a large carcass is possible but remains speculative.
The first skeleton was found in 1976 by a worker at a dam construction site in Yongchuan (formerly spelled Yangchuan), Sichuan, China.
The species was described in 1978 by the Chinese palaeontologist Dong Zhiming and colleagues.
The holotype skull measures about 82 cm; a much larger specimen once named Yangchuanosaurus magnus has a skull of roughly 111 cm and is now usually treated as a big individual of the same species.
The low bony crest on the snout was most likely a display structure rather than a weapon.
Yangchuanosaurus belongs to the family Metriacanthosauridae, a group only distantly related to Allosaurus within Allosauroidea.
The same rocks preserve the long-necked Mamenchisaurus and the spiky stegosaurs Tuojiangosaurus and Chialingosaurus, plausible prey animals.
At up to nearly eleven metres it was one of the largest known Jurassic predators of East Asia.
No feather impressions are known for Yangchuanosaurus or its close relatives, so it is normally reconstructed with scaly skin.
Chapter • Scientific place
Natural History Museum, London
Reviewed: 9/8/2026
General authoritative overview of Yangchuanosaurus covering its size, body form, age, diet and Chinese provenance.
Open sourceJournal of Systematic Palaeontology (Taylor & Francis)
Reviewed: 9/8/2026
Carrano, Benson & Sampson's tetanuran phylogenetic analysis places Yangchuanosaurus within Metriacanthosauridae inside Allosauroidea, Avetheropoda, Orionides and Tetanurae.
Open sourceThe Paleobiology Database
Reviewed: 9/8/2026
Lists the recorded fossil collections, localities in Sichuan/Chongqing, China, and the stratigraphic occurrences of Yangchuanosaurus.
Open sourceVolumina Jurassica (Polish Geological Institute)
Reviewed: 9/8/2026
Documents the fluvio-lacustrine Shaximiao Formation depositional setting and the dinosaur fauna of the Sichuan Basin in which Yangchuanosaurus occurs.
Open sourceAustralian Museum
Reviewed: 9/8/2026
Museum fact sheet describing Yangchuanosaurus shangyouensis as a large carnivorous theropod predator, with details of its teeth and feeding.
Open sourceThe Paleobiology Database
Reviewed: 9/8/2026
Extinct taxon; conservation status NE
Open sourceNatural History Museum, London
Reviewed: 9/8/2026
General authoritative overview of Yangchuanosaurus covering its size, body form, age, diet and Chinese provenance.
Open sourceNatural History Museum, London
Reviewed: 9/8/2026
General authoritative overview of Yangchuanosaurus covering its size, body form, age, diet and Chinese provenance.
Open sourceNatural History Museum, London
Reviewed: 9/8/2026
General authoritative overview of Yangchuanosaurus covering its size, body form, age, diet and Chinese provenance.
Open source