what defines a nano

[treesprite]

I'm a bit confused about this. I always thought of a nano as being under like 20g, but a lot of people have "nanos" that are up to 40+ . Are people inter-changing nano with "biocube" or similar type of setup?

[Jon Lazar]

From the nano-reef.com glossary of terms:

 

"A small reef aquarium, generally 20 gallons or less. Also known as nanoreef or nano-reef."

 

HTH

[gmubeach]

I always thought of a nano as under 55 gallons:) My 24 is a nano cube? anyway maybe we should form a definition for the club I was thinking under 55 gallons because this will open the forum up a little bit its not used very much by the club!

[txaggies07]

Who cares what you call it. It is a fish tank...on the smaller side. My big tank is a 120g...so to me my 24g is most definitely a nano...or small tank....or little piece of reef heaven...or whatever you call it.

Edited July 15, 2008 by txaggies07

[treesprite]

I don't really care how people define their own tanks, but was pretty sure there was a standard definition. To me a 65 is a medium-sized tank, but to someone with a 300g tank it's a nano. Are there ways to define a nano besides size?

[txaggies07]

Nano is just a cool word that means small. I am sure people have posted "standard definitions" places. It doesn't matter though. Defining a tank as a nano doesn't mean anything at all. It doesn't help you determine anything. It doesn't really mean anything at all outside of small.

[kmitch]

We debate this on N-R alot- Nano's have gotten bigger over the last few years with the increased number of All In One tanks that have gotten larger (ex Current Solana, Red Sea Max, 29 Gal Biocube, 24 gal Aquapod, etc). As more and more of those appear on the market the definition of nano has increased. I'd say its less than 40 gals these days. There seems to be a big jump between your ~30gal tanks and then the 55gals, don't see alot in between.

[treesprite]

I used to have a 30 - that I would call a large nano. I had a 45 and I would definately not call that a nano at 3ft long and 2 ft high. Maybe it should be by dimensions and not volumn... area does more for determining stocking than volumn does.