Shark fins are used primarily as a food ingredient, most famously in shark fin soup, a dish with deep roots in Chinese cuisine. Beyond the kitchen, shark fins and their cartilage show up in traditional medicine, dietary supplements, and even skincare products. The global frozen shark fin market was valued at roughly $110 million in 2024, with China paying an average of about $13,500 per ton for imported fins.
Shark Fin Soup: Texture, Not Flavor
The overwhelming majority of shark fins end up in soup. What surprises most people is that the fins themselves have almost no taste. The flavor of shark fin soup comes entirely from the broth, which is typically a rich stock of chicken, ham, or seafood. The fins are prized for their texture alone, described variously as “snappy and gelatinous,” “chewy,” and “somewhere between chewy and crunchy.”
The texture comes from structures called ceratotrichia, which are large collagen fibers that run through the fin in rows. These thin, translucent strands, sometimes called “fin needles,” give the soup its signature stringy, silky consistency. Preparing them is labor-intensive. Raw fins must be skinned, trimmed, shaped, and bleached to improve their color. Dried fins then need to be softened, and historical Chinese recipes called for boiling them for two full days before use. Beyond soup, fins have traditionally been used in stews and stir-fries, though soup remains by far the most common preparation.
Shark fin soup has been served at Chinese banquets and celebrations for centuries, signaling wealth and generosity. Its role is largely symbolic. Because the fin contributes texture rather than flavor, plant-based substitutes have gained traction. Mung bean vermicelli noodles are the most common stand-in, mimicking the translucent, slippery quality of real fin at a fraction of the cost and without the conservation concerns.
Traditional Medicine and Supplements
In traditional Chinese medicine, shark fin and cartilage are claimed to nourish the blood, enhance appetite, and support the function of multiple internal organs. These claims have not been validated by modern clinical research. Shark cartilage is sold in powder and capsule form, often marketed alongside joint health supplements because it contains compounds like chondroitin and glucosamine sulfate, both commonly found in over-the-counter arthritis products.
The most heavily promoted medical claim has been that shark cartilage can fight cancer. This idea gained popularity in the 1990s, based on the observation that cartilage contains substances that block the growth of new blood vessels, a process tumors depend on. Researchers identified at least two such compounds in shark cartilage, and more than half a dozen clinical studies were conducted over three decades. The results were underwhelming. In one study of patients with advanced kidney cancer, only 3 out of 22 patients who stayed on treatment for more than three months showed even a partial response, and none achieved a complete response. The FDA has not approved shark cartilage as a treatment for cancer or any other condition.
Cosmetic and Skincare Uses
Shark cartilage is a source of type II collagen, which has become a sought-after ingredient in cosmetics and dietary beauty supplements. Marine collagen has largely replaced mammal-derived collagen in many skincare products because it’s considered to have lower risk of triggering immune reactions. In lab and clinical testing, hydrolyzed shark cartilage (broken down into smaller, absorbable fragments) improved skin hydration, elasticity, and texture. It also showed wrinkle-smoothing effects and helped control oil secretion.
Collagen from shark and other marine sources functions as a moisturizer, a film-forming agent on the skin’s surface, and a humectant that draws in water. These properties make it useful in anti-aging creams, serums, and supplements. That said, collagen from many other marine sources (fish skin, for example) delivers similar benefits, so shark-derived collagen is not uniquely valuable for cosmetic purposes.
Health Risks of Consuming Shark Fin
Shark fins carry significant contamination risks. Sharks are apex predators, meaning toxins accumulate in their bodies over long lifespans. According to FDA data from 1991 to 2007, shark meat contains an average mercury concentration of 0.979 parts per million, with some samples reaching as high as 4.54 ppm. That places shark among the most mercury-contaminated commercial seafood available, well above the levels in most fish people eat regularly.
Beyond mercury, researchers have raised concerns about a neurotoxin called BMAA (beta-methylamino-L-alanine) found in shark fins. BMAA has been linked in laboratory research to neurodegenerative diseases. Because shark fin is consumed in concentrated form, and because cartilage supplements deliver it in regular doses, repeated exposure could pose risks that occasional consumption of other seafood would not.
Conservation and Legal Restrictions
The shark fin trade has driven steep population declines in multiple species. In 2013, five threatened shark species were added to Appendix II of CITES, the international treaty governing wildlife trade. The listed species included scalloped hammerhead, great hammerhead, oceanic whitetip, and porbeagle sharks. Under these rules, any country exporting fins from listed species must certify that the specimens were legally caught and that the trade is sustainable.
These regulations have had limited real-world impact. Certification proved difficult because most nations didn’t track shark catches by species, and some regional fisheries agreements already banned keeping certain listed species entirely. Between 2015 and 2021, very little legal trade in these species was officially reported, yet fins from four of the five listed species remained common in Hong Kong, the world’s largest shark fin trading hub. This gap points to substantial ongoing illegal trade. Several countries and U.S. states have enacted outright bans on the sale and possession of shark fins, but enforcement across global supply chains remains a persistent challenge.