The bigeye snapper was first formally described in 1790 by the German physician and zoologist Marcus Elieser Bloch with the type locality given as Japan, although this is thought to be erroneous and is actually Indonesia.

[2] The upper back is golden-brown in colour with silvery-white flanks[6] with a brown to yellow stripe running from the snout to the dorsal caudal peduncle.

It is found from the Red Sea and the eastern African coast as far south as South Africa and Madagascar east along the southern Asian coast, including the Seychelles, into the Pacific where it has been recorded from Tonga and Wallis Island.

[1] Between 1979 and 1982 2,286 tonnes was reported to the FAO as being taken in the Gulf of Suez representing 10-20% of the annual snapper landings in that region.

[6] However, this species remains locally abundant and has stable populations so the IUCN have assessed it as Least Concern.