The leatherback gets its name from its shell, which is like a thick leathery skin, with the texture of hard rubber. Average carapace length is 61 inches. The triangular-shaped carapace is covered with a layer of rubbery skin rather than horny shields, and it has seven longitudinal ridges. The head and neck are black or dark brown with a few white or yellow blotches. The paddle-like clawless limbs are black with white margins and may have white spots.
Hatchlings are dark brown or black with white or yellow carapacial keels and flipper margins.
It is a circumglobal species, meaning that it can range throughout almost all the oceans of the world. It nests on tropical beaches in the Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific Oceans. Once abundant throughout the world's oceans, all eight species of sea turtles are now threatened or endangered. Leatherback populations have plummeted in recent years. In the 1980s the worldwide population was estimated at nearly 100,000.