Allosaurus Facts

Allosaurus was a large, carnivorous dinosaur that lived during the Late Jurassic period around 150-145 million years ago.

The Allosaurus thrived in a variety of different environments from dry arid deserts to lush tropical rainforests and its fossils have been found in Africa, Europe and North America.

Part of the Theropod family of dinosaurs the Allosaurus stood on 2 legs and measured around 9 meters long from head to tail and about 4.5 meters high at the hip.

The large size of the dinosaur coupled with its large head and tail meant it weighed up to 2.5 tons.

The Allosaurus had a large head which contained powerful jaws and rows of razor-sharp teeth making it ideally adapted to eating the flesh of other dinosaurs. As an apex predator, the Allosaurus preyed on a wide variety of dinosaurs, including sauropods, stegosaurs, and ornithopods and it is thought to have hunted in packs so could have taken down some of the biggest dinosaurs.

The name Allosaurus translates from Greek to mean "different lizard". It is called this because when it was first discovered its vertebrae were different to other dinosaur bones as they were concave.

Allosaurus was a bipedal dinosaur, meaning it stood on two legs. This allowed it to move quickly and chase after its prey. It also had short, powerful arms, with three fingers on each hand, each ending in sharp claws. These claws were likely used to grasp and hold onto prey while it was being killed.