It is hard to guess what a Capybara weights. But we have the answer:
An adult Capybara (Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris) on average weights 48.14 kg (106.14 lbs).
The Capybara is from the family Caviidae (genus: Hydrochoerus). It is usually born with about 1.5 kg (3.31 lbs). They can live for up to 12 years. When reaching adult age, they grow up to 1.21 meter (4′ 0″). On average, Capybaras can have babies 1 times per year with a litter size of 3.
As a reference: An average human weights in at 62 kg (137 lbs) and reaches an average size of 1.65m (5′ 5″). Humans spend 280 days (40 weeks) in the womb of their mother and reach around 75 years of age.
The capybara (Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris) is a giant cavy rodent native to South America. It is the largest living rodent in the world. Also called capivara (in Brazil), chigüire, chigüiro (in Colombia and Venezuela), carpincho (in Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay) and ronsoco (in Peru), it is a member of the genus Hydrochoerus, of which the only other extant member is the lesser capybara (Hydrochoerus isthmius). Its close relatives include guinea pigs and rock cavies, and it is more distantly related to the agouti, the chinchilla, and the coypu. The capybara inhabits savannas and dense forests and lives near bodies of water. It is a highly social species and can be found in groups as large as 100 individuals, but usually lives in groups of 10–20 individuals. The capybara is not a threatened species, but it is hunted for its meat and hide and also for grease from its thick fatty skin.
Animals of the same family as a Capybara
We found other animals of the Caviidae family:
- Rock cavy with a weight of 800 grams
- Greater guinea pig with a weight of 460 grams
- Southern mountain cavy with a weight of 261 grams
- Spix’s yellow-toothed cavy with a weight of 361 grams
- Shiny guinea pig with a weight of 283 grams
- Brazilian yellow-toothed cavy with a weight of 450 grams
- Common yellow-toothed cavy with a weight of 387 grams
- Andean mountain cavy with a weight of 255 grams
- Brazilian guinea pig with a weight of 524 grams
- Montane guinea pig bringing 1 kilos (2.2 lbs) to the scale
Animals with the same weight as a Capybara
As a comparison, here are some other animals that weight as much as the Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris:
- Abbott’s duiker with a weight of 56.68 kilos (124.96 lbs)
- Brown hyena with a weight of 42.98 kilos (94.75 lbs)
- Red gazelle with a weight of 40 kilos (88.18 lbs)
- Brown hyena with a weight of 43.4 kilos (95.68 lbs)
- Sumatran orangutan with a weight of 39.7 kilos (87.52 lbs)
- Harnessed bushbuck with a weight of 43.28 kilos (95.42 lbs)
- Impala with a weight of 52.45 kilos (115.63 lbs)
- East Caucasian tur with a weight of 57.5 kilos (126.77 lbs)
- Red kangaroo with a weight of 38.98 kilos (85.94 lbs)
- Calamian deer with a weight of 39.66 kilos (87.44 lbs)
Animals with the same size as a Capybara
Not that size really matters, but it makes things comparable. So here are a couple of animals that are as big as Capybara:
- Proserpine rock-wallaby with a size of 100 cm (3′ 4″)
- Mountain reedbuck with a size of 1.23 meter (4′ 1″)
- Yellow-backed duiker with a size of 1.32 meter (4′ 5″)
- Brown hyena with a size of 1.2 meter (4′ 0″)
- Iberian ibex with a size of 1.2 meter (4′ 0″)
- Goa (antelope) with a size of 98 cm (3′ 3″)
- Giant anteater with a size of 1.12 meter (3′ 9″)
- Javan warty pig with a size of 1.25 meter (4′ 2″)
- Siberian roe deer with a size of 1.32 meter (4′ 4″)
- Aardvark with a size of 1.26 meter (4′ 2″)
Animals with the same litter size as a Capybara
Here is a list of animals that have the same number of babies per litter (3) as a Capybara:
- Gray climbing mouse
- Amazonian marsh rat
- Four-toed hedgehog
- Northern flying squirrel
- Short-nosed harvest mouse
- Crab-eating fox
- Lesser red musk shrew
- Nephelomys albigularis
- Ring-tailed ground squirrel
- American hog-nosed skunk
Animals with the same life expectancy as a Capybara
Completely different animals, but becoming as old as a Capybara:
- Striped polecat with an average maximal age of 13.33 years
- Fishing cat with an average maximal age of 10 years
- Brown mouse lemur with an average maximal age of 12 years
- Horsfield’s tarsier with an average maximal age of 12 years
- Common bent-wing bat with an average maximal age of 14 years
- Günther’s dik-dik with an average maximal age of 14 years
- European polecat with an average maximal age of 14 years
- Fisher (animal) with an average maximal age of 10.08 years
- Pallas’s long-tongued bat with an average maximal age of 10 years
- Suni with an average maximal age of 14 years