[5] Lizardite may form a solid-solution series with the nickel-bearing népouite (pure end-member: Ni3(Si2O5)(OH)4).

[6] However, the lizardite end-member is much more common than pure népouite, a relatively rare mineral most often formed by the alteration of ultramafic rocks.

Lizardite is translucent and soft, and may be pseudomorphous after enstatite, olivine or pyroxene, in which case the name bastite is sometimes applied.

[1] Lizardite was named by Eric James William Whittaker and Jack Zussman in 1955 after the place it was first reported, the Lizard Peninsula, (from the Cornish: An Lysardh) in southern Cornwall, England, United Kingdom.

[13]: 118–119 As of 1989, only a single specimen of lizardite had been found in Mont-Saint-Hilaire, Quebec where it may occur in altered pegmatites.

[11] In the Frank Smith mine located in South Africa, lizardite was the dominant serpentine mineral.