Bony fishes are a diverse taxonomic group of fish that have skeletons primarily composed of bone tissue. The vast majority of fishes are members of Osteichthyes, which is an extremely diverse and abundant group consisting of 45 orders, and over 435 families, and around 28,000 species. It is the largest class of vertebrates in existence today. The oldest known fossils of bony fish are about 420 million years old.
