The family Vespertilionidae is the largest bat family in the world: about one third of all bat species, and more than half of the species found in Israel, belong to this family, which includes more than 400 species, belonging to 48 genera. This is a highly diverse family which, despite the label “insect bats” stuck to them, some of its members have a more varied menu (Savi's pipistrelle, for example). In the country, the richest genera in species are the genus Myotis (Myotis) and Pipistrellus ( (Pipistrellus. Some recent updates concerning the genera Kerivoula and Plecotus are still missing from the species pages.

To view the species pages, you can use the drop-down menu or the following links:

Desert pipistrelle - inhabits deep, humid caves in the Mediterranean region
Kuhl's pipistrelle - inhabits caves and natural and artificial cavities
Savi's pipistrelle - insectivorous bat inhabiting deep, humid caves in the Mediterranean region
Greater mouse-eared bat - critically endangered
Common pipistrelle - critically endangered
Whiskered bat - A species first discovered in Israel, in the Hermon, in 1994.
Leisler's bat - currently observed mainly in the north of the country
Nathusius' pipistrelle - a Palaearctic species, found along the Rift Valley and in the Negev.
Lesser short-nosed fruit bat - most common in human settlements, and may even displace other species
European pipistrelle - a small bat species; in Israel, the southern limit of the species' range
Savi's pipistrelle - rare in the north of the country
Ariel's pipistrelle - only one individual has been found in Israel; its taxonomic status is doubtful
Bodenheimer's pipistrelle - found along the Rift Valley, also penetrating into the Negev
Rüppell's pipistrelle - Israel forms the northern limit of the species' range
Plecotus - found in the Negev, the Judean Desert and the Arava
Plecotus - a desert species; there may be two species in Israel
Kerivoula - was it common in Israel in the 1940s? Endangered
Schwarz's woolly bat - a rare desert species
Noctule - flies high and fast, rare in the north of the country