The Jaws movie poster is one of the most iconic images in cinematic history: a lone swimmer glides across the ocean surface, unaware of the massive shark emerging from the depths below. With its gaping maw, serrated teeth, and sleek body, the poster promises terror—and it delivered. But contrary to popular belief, the shark illustrated in the poster is not a great white shark, the species featured in the film. Instead, it’s a mako shark, a different species altogether.
This surprising fact comes down to the origins of the artwork. The now-famous image was painted by artist Roger Kastel, who was commissioned to create a striking visual for the paperback edition of Peter Benchley’s novel Jaws, which was released in 1974. The same artwork was later used, with minimal modification, for the promotional poster of the 1975 Steven Spielberg film adaptation.
Kastel’s inspiration didn’t come from marine biology textbooks or footage of great whites. Instead, the shark was modeled after an illustration from a Reader’s Digest magazine—specifically, a painting of a mako shark. At the time, mako sharks were often depicted in artwork for their dramatic, streamlined appearance and menacing features. Their long, pointed snouts and almost torpedo-like bodies made for compelling visual subjects. In contrast, real great whites have broader, blunter heads and a more robust, bulky form.
If you compare the shark in the poster to real-life specimens, the differences become clear. The shark in the Jaws poster has a narrow snout, relatively large eyes, and a slim profile—traits consistent with the shortfin mako (Isurus oxyrinchus), the fastest of all shark species and known for its acrobatic breaches. Great white sharks (Carcharodon carcharias), by contrast, have smaller eyes, shorter snouts, and a more triangular head shape.
Of course, the choice of shark species was likely unintentional. The primary goal of the Jaws poster was to invoke fear, not taxonomic accuracy. And in that regard, the mako model was wildly effective. The monstrous size of the shark in the poster (which far exceeds even the largest great whites known to science) contributes to the mythic quality of the creature—a near-supernatural force of nature lurking beneath the waves.
In the film itself, the mechanical shark used for production was based on a great white’s anatomy. Nicknamed “Bruce” by the crew, the shark was designed to look like an enormous great white, albeit one that proved infamously unreliable during filming. Nevertheless, it was always understood that the fictional shark terrorizing Amity Island was meant to be a rogue great white shark, a creature whose realistic presence grounded the horror of the film in a plausible scenario.
That makes the disconnect between the poster and the film all the more interesting. The visual language of Jaws—the looming threat, the primal fear of the unknown—was unintentionally built around the wrong shark. The mako shark in the poster has since become culturally entangled with the idea of the “killer shark,” even though makos are far less likely to interact with humans and are not known to target them.
This mix-up has led to some confusion among shark enthusiasts and film buffs alike. It also serves as a fascinating example of how visual media shapes our perceptions of nature. The image on the Jaws poster helped define the public image of sharks for decades, fueling both fascination and fear. Yet it was a mako shark, not a great white, that gave that fear its unforgettable face.
So next time you look at the Jaws poster, remember: the real horror icon might not be what it seems. It’s a mako shark masquerading as a great white—and it just might be the most famous case of mistaken identity in movie history.