# Classification up to species level

**URL:** <https://forum.mothur.org/t/classification-up-to-species-level/3479>\
**Category:** Journal club\
**Created:** [January 9, 2018, 1:15pm UTC](https://forum.mothur.org/t/classification-up-to-species-level/3479 "2018-01-09T13:15:24Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![jitendrakeshri](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8e8cbc/32.png) [@jitendrakeshri](https://forum.mothur.org/u/jitendrakeshri)\
**Post date:** [January 9, 2018, 1:15pm UTC](https://forum.mothur.org/t/classification-up-to-species-level/3479/1 "2018-01-09T13:15:24Z")

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Hi,  
I wonder if we can classify the 16s rRNA data up to species level. I was going through the EzBioCloud 16S database and there was suggestions that we can classify 16S ngs data up to species level. They have curated formats are compatible with QIIME and MOTHUR pipelines.

> **[EzBioCloud.net | Search about Bacteria or Archaea](https://www.ezbiocloud.net/resources/16s_download)**
>
> EzBioCloud.net is cloud-based, Big Data Analysis platform for microbiology and infectious disease research. We provide comprehensive resources for bacterial identification, genomics and microbiome.

I tried my sequences with their database, the results up to genus level is more or less similar to Silva, but it further classifies sequences to several species. I have doubt on validity of the results, whether we can present data of species level classification based on only 460 bp of 16S?

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**Author:** ![pschloss](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/forum.mothur.org/pschloss/32/4_2.png) [@pschloss](https://forum.mothur.org/u/pschloss)\
**Post date:** [January 10, 2018, 1:04pm UTC](https://forum.mothur.org/t/classification-up-to-species-level/3479/2 "2018-01-10T13:04:00Z")

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Sorry, but it really isn’t reliable to classify 16S rRNA gene sequences (much less 250 nt) to the species level. You really need a full genome sequence to pull that off.

pat

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**Author:** ![jitendrakeshri](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8e8cbc/32.png) [@jitendrakeshri](https://forum.mothur.org/u/jitendrakeshri)\
**Post date:** [January 14, 2018, 3:12pm UTC](https://forum.mothur.org/t/classification-up-to-species-level/3479/3 "2018-01-14T15:12:47Z")

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Thanks Pat for clearing my doubt!

Regards,  
Jitendra