Dino card No. 0918 of 2,027

Jinchuanloong

Say it: jin-CHWAN-loong

Name means: “Jinchuan dragon, named after the Jinchuan District where it was found”1

Ate: PlantsLong-necksMiddle Jurassic

Jinchuanloong was a long-necked, plant-eating dinosaur that lived about 168 million years ago. It walked on four sturdy legs and had a very long tail. Scientists found its skull, neck bones, and tail bones in China.1 2

Lived

168 to 165 million years ago4

Middle Jurassic

Fossils found in

Jinchuan District, Jinchang City, Gansu Province, northwestern China1 2

Food

Plants3 2

Length

10 m2 1

estimate based on the spacing of the preserved bones; the animal may have been a subadult or juvenile

When did it live?

Triassic

Jurassic

Cretaceous

252 million years ago20114566, the asteroid

How big was it?

as long as 2 cars parked in a rowas long as 56 bananas end to end

How big was Jinchuanloong compared to YOU?

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cool stuff

Fun facts

Jinchuanloong's skull is one of the most complete ever found for an early sauropod dinosaur.1 2

Its name 'niedu' comes from the Mandarin words for 'nickel' and 'city', because Jinchuan is famous for its nickel mines.1 2

The fossil includes the first five neck bones still attached to the skull, and 29 tail bones that were still in a row.1 2

Scientists think the holotype was not fully grown because some of its skull bones were not fused together.1

Jinchuanloong lived during the Middle Jurassic, about 168 to 165 million years ago, in what is now northwestern China.3 2

It belongs to a group called eusauropods, which includes many of the largest land animals that ever lived.1 2

AI-made picture of Jinchuanloong — An AI-made picture of how Jinchuanloong might have looked, made by a computer from what scientists know. It is a guess: the real animal may have looked different, and nobody knows its true colours.

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For dino experts

Scientific name: Jinchuanloong
Named by: Li et al. 20254
Group: Long-necks
Family / clade: Eusauropoda4
Classification: Sauropodomorpha > Sauropoda4
Age of the rocks: 168 to 165 million years (Bathonian)4
Rock formations: Xinhe4
Countries: China4
Fossil records: 1 in the Paleobiology Database4
Discovery: The fossil was found in 2017 by Dr. Li Daqing during fieldwork in Gansu Province, China. It was named and described by Li and colleagues in 2025.1 2
Still debated: Scientists are not sure if the holotype was a juvenile or a subadult, because some bones were unfused but it was already about 10 metres long.1

Where the facts come from

Jinchuanloong (en.wikipedia.org)
A new eusauropod (Dinosauria, Sauropodomorpha) from the Middle Jurassic of Gansu, China | Scientific Reports (preview-www.nature.com)
PBDB Taxon (paleobiodb.org)
Jinchuanloong in The Paleobiology Database (CC BY 4.0): age, places, rock formations, classification.

Every fact on this page has a number that points to its source. If we got something wrong, sorry, we are dino fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.

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