Micropanchax is a genus of small African killifish commonly called lampeyes, named for the bright, iridescent patch above the eye that many species show under good light. The atlas's 15 species range across sub-Saharan Africa, including Angola, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Guinea, Kenya, and Mozambique, and most are found in slow, still, or vegetated water such as swamps, lagoons, floodplain pools, and the marginal shallows of lakes and streams rather than fast current. They are surface-oriented fish with an upturned mouth suited to picking small insects and other prey from the water's surface film, and, unlike the annual killifish of the seasonal savanna, lampeyes lay eggs continuously in permanent or semi-permanent water rather than relying on a dry-season diapause.
Several species here carry established common names, including the black lampeye (Micropanchax antinorii), Cameroon lampeye (M. camerunensis), Johnston's lampeye (M. johnstoni), King's lampeye (M. kingii), and Lake Rudolf lampeye (M. rudolfianus), and a handful have found their way into the specialist killifish hobby as peaceful, easy-to-keep schooling fish for softer water. Most of the genus is assessed as Least Concern, though one species is listed as Endangered and several remain unassessed, and the group as a whole is of more interest to biogeographers tracing Africa's freshwater drainage history than to the mainstream aquarium trade.