Giant golden orbweaver
A female giant golden orbweaver can grow ten times longer and over a hundred times heavier than her mate, among the most extreme size gaps in any land animal.
| Where | Forests and shrubland across Asia |
|---|---|
| Size | Female 25 to 50 mm, male 4 to 6.5 mm body length |
| When | January to December |
Females have a dark yellow brown abdomen marked with pairs of yellow stripes, black and yellow banded legs, and a small horn like bulge near the front of the abdomen. They spin a large, asymmetric golden web, often over a metre across, anchored between trees or across forest paths and building edges.
The spider stays at the hub of its web through the whole day, turning its body to shade itself as temperatures rise, and continues to take prey caught after dark since the web is rarely taken down. Adult males are barely a centimetre long and gather at the edge of a female's web waiting for a chance to mate.
Traits
Habitat
Woodland
Colour
Black, Yellow, Brown
Active
Day and night
To people
Bites are rare and not medically significant, causing only brief local pain if this large spider is handled; it is not aggressive and prefers to stay on its web.
Activity through the year
Often confused with
Smaller, with females reaching only 17 to 25 mm, and with red coloring toward the rear of the abdomen that the giant golden orbweaver lacks.
Questions
Is the Giant golden orbweaver dangerous to people?
Bites are rare and not medically significant, causing only brief local pain if this large spider is handled; it is not aggressive and prefers to stay on its web.
When can you see the Giant golden orbweaver?
The Giant golden orbweaver can be seen from January to December, by day and at night.
Plate retouched from a photo by naturalist67279, CC0, iNaturalist Licence
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Spiders›Orb-weaver spiders›Nephila
Last updated 2026-09-27. Every entry is checked against published sources.