Head to head
Indian Cobra vs King Cobra
The name suggests the king cobra is simply the biggest and most royal of the cobras. It is not a cobra in the strict sense at all. The true cobras, including the Indian or spectacled cobra, belong to the genus Naja; the king cobra sits in its own genus, Ophiophagus, whose name means snake-eater, and it lives a very different life.
| Indian Cobra | King Cobra | |
|---|---|---|
| Is it a true cobra? | Yes, genus Naja | No, genus Ophiophagus (its own genus) |
| Length | 1 to 1.5 m | 3 to 4 m, up to 5.5 m |
| Diet | Rodents, frogs, birds, lizards | Almost entirely other snakes |
| Hood | Broad, often with a spectacle mark | Narrower, no spectacle mark |
| Venom | Neurotoxic and cytotoxic; moderate volume | Mainly neurotoxic; very large volume per bite |
| Nesting | Lays eggs and leaves them | Builds a mound nest and guards the eggs, unique among snakes |
| Bites on people | Common; a leading cause of snakebite death in India | Rare; the snake is shy and lives away from people |
| Conservation status | Least Concern | Vulnerable |
Cobra vs King Cobra: common questions
Is a king cobra actually a cobra?
Not in the strict, scientific sense. The true cobras are the roughly 30 species in the genus Naja, which includes the Indian cobra, the Egyptian cobra, the Cape cobra, the monocled cobra, and the various spitting cobras. The king cobra is the sole member of a separate genus, Ophiophagus, and DNA studies place it closer to the mambas and to some Asian coral snakes than to the true cobras. It earns the name cobra because it can spread a hood, and it is the king because it is the largest venomous snake in the world and because it preys on the true cobras. But taxonomically it is its own thing.
Which one is deadlier?
It depends whether you mean the venom or the real-world toll. The king cobra delivers an enormous quantity of venom in a single bite, enough to kill an elephant or several people, and an untreated bite can cause death from respiratory paralysis within hours. But king cobras are shy, live in forests away from settlements, and account for very few bites. The Indian cobra has less venom per bite and a somewhat less rapidly lethal effect, but it lives in and around fields, homes, and grain stores across one of the most densely populated regions on Earth, so it bites vast numbers of people, and it is one of the main contributors to India's estimated tens of thousands of snakebite deaths a year. By that measure the ordinary cobra is far deadlier to humans.
Do king cobras really eat other cobras?
Yes, routinely. The king cobra is a specialist snake-eater, and its diet is made up almost entirely of other snakes, including rat snakes, pythons, kraits, and true cobras, along with the occasional monitor lizard. It hunts by following scent trails, overpowers the prey with a bite, holds on while the neurotoxic venom takes effect, and then swallows the snake head-first, often one nearly as long as itself. Being resistant to the venom of the snakes it eats is part of the package. This diet is why the king cobra needs such a large territory and is so sensitive to forest loss, and it is the origin of the genus name Ophiophagus, snake-eater.