Appearance At birth, this dolphin is unspotted, with a strongly defined cape, a flipper stripe ending at the mouth and a peduncle with a dark upper part and a lighter lower part. Spots appear ventrally first and later light dorsal spots appear. The dark ventral spots increase in size and number and merge in some areas. The same happens to the light dorsal spots. There is a lot of regional variation in coloration and spotting.
Coastal dolphins are in general more heavily spotted than pelagic dolphins.
In some areas, such as Hawaii and St. Helena, spotting is poorly developed and is only visible at close range. There is also regional variation in size. The oceanic ETP dolphins are the smallest at 200 cm for males and 187 cm for females. The pantropical spotted dolphins in the Atlantic are on average 215 resp. This species can be found worldwide in tropical and some subtropical waters.