Fishing Lure Types Explained

Every lure is answering two questions: what depth does it run, and what does it do there. Sort the wall of tackle that way and it stops being overwhelming.

The six families

Soft plastics — start here

Worms, grubs, creature baits and paddle-tail swimbaits, moulded from flexible plastic. The most versatile family on the list, because the same bait fishes three ways: weightless and slow-falling, on a jig head to reach bottom, or rigged weedless with the hook point buried so you can throw it into cover.

That last option is why soft plastics own heavy grass and timber — see hook types for how a weedless rig works.

Swimbaits are the sub-family worth naming separately: a body with a paddle tail that thumps on a straight retrieve. They need no technique at all, which makes them ideal early.

Crankbaits — covering water

A fat body with a plastic lip at the nose. The lip catches water, pulls the lure down and makes it wobble. You cast it and wind it, and it does the rest.

The lip sets the depth. Bigger and flatter digs deeper. Manufacturers print a target range on the box — treat it as a guide, because your line diameter and how far you cast both change how deep it actually gets. Thinner line and longer casts run deeper.

Crankbaits carry treble hooks, which matters for tackle choice: a stiff rod tears small trebles out of a thrashing fish. This is exactly why crankbait rods are deliberately slower, and why many people still fish them on monofilament — see rod action and power and fishing line explained for the two things doing the cushioning.

Jerkbaits — working a spot

Slim and minnow-shaped, fished in twitches with pauses so it darts and then sits, imitating a wounded baitfish. Where a crankbait covers water, a jerkbait works one piece of it thoroughly.

The pause is the lure. Most bites come while it is sitting still. Beginners fish jerkbaits too fast.

Spinners and spoons — the oldest trick that still works

Inline spinners have a blade that rotates around the shaft, producing flash and vibration. Cast, wind steadily, catch fish. Genuinely one of the best beginner lures because there is no technique to get wrong.

Spoons are curved metal that wobbles and flashes, fished on a steady retrieve or jigged vertically. Simple, cheap and devastating on salmon, trout and pike.

Both work because they push water. A fish's lateral line detects that vibration before its eyes are involved at all — which matters in dirty water where sight is useless.

Poppers — the surface

A cupped or flat face that throws water and makes noise when you jerk the rod. Purely topwater.

Pop it, then wait. The pause is where the strike comes. Best at dawn, dusk and after dark, and the most exciting way to catch a fish, which is why people fish them long after conditions stop justifying it.

Metal jigs — deep and vertical

Heavy slabs of metal that sink fast and are worked with sharp upward lifts and a controlled drop. The bite usually comes on the fall.

The tool for depth, current and wind — anywhere a light lure never reaches bottom. Standard for saltwater vertical fishing.

Floating, sinking, suspending — what happens when you stop

This is a genuinely useful distinction the packaging labels and few people use:

• Floating — rises when you pause. Lets you back a lure over a snag.
• Sinking — keeps going down. Lets you count it down to a depth.
• Suspending — holds its depth and hangs motionless.

Suspending is the cold-water answer. A cold fish is slow to commit, and a lure that stops dead and simply hangs in front of it gives it time to decide. A floater rises out of the zone; a sinker drops out of it. The suspender stays.

Colour: what the physics actually says

Tackle shops sell colour hard. Here is what is verifiable.

Water strips colours out in a fixed order. NOAA states it plainly: "Blue light penetrates best, green light is second, yellow light is third, followed by orange light and red light." Red is the first to disappear.

The consequence NOAA spells out for deep-sea animals applies exactly to your lure: at 100 metres, red light does not penetrate, and a red fish there "appears blackish because there is no red light to reflect at that depth." That is why so many deep-sea animals are red — it makes them effectively invisible.

So a red lure fished deep is not a red lure. It is a dark silhouette.

An honest limit on this advice. NOAA's published figure is for 100 metres, which is deeper than most people fish. Attenuation is progressive, so red is fading well above that — but we have not found an agency figure for the shallow depths that actually matter to a bank angler, so we are not going to invent one. What is solid is the order: red goes first, blue lasts longest.

Practical version:

• Shallow and clear — colour choice is real. Match the baitfish.
• Deeper, or stained — contrast and silhouette beat hue. Dark against a bright surface, or bright against gloom.
• Dirty water — stop thinking about colour and start thinking about vibration and noise. A thumping paddle tail or a spinner blade reaches a fish that cannot see anything.

That is why chartreuse and black both work in muddy water, despite being opposites on a colour chart. Neither is being seen as a colour; both are being seen as contrast.

A first lure box

Five things that cover most freshwater:

1. Soft plastic swimbaits on jig heads — a couple of sizes
2. An inline spinner or two
3. A shallow crankbait
4. A suspending jerkbait
5. Weedless hooks and a pack of soft plastic worms for cover

Our freshwater lure guide and saltwater lure guide cover specific pre-rigged options that arrive with hooks attached.

Related

• Fishing hook types — trebles, weedless and jig heads
• Rod action and power — why crankbait rods bend more
• Fishing line explained — and why mono suits trebles
• Rigs & setups — what goes on the line, in order

Sources

• Why are so many deep-sea animals red in color? — NOAA Ocean Exploration — the order in which light penetrates water (blue best, then green, yellow, orange, red); that at 100 metres red light does not penetrate and a red fish is difficult if not impossible to see; and that a red animal appears blackish at depth because there is no red light to reflect.
• Student Investigation: Light and Color in the Deep Ocean — NOAA Ocean Exploration — that red light disappears at a shallower depth in the water column while blue light penetrates deepest.