SpongeBob SquarePants (born July 14, 1986[8]) is the one of the ten main characters of the animated franchise of the same name. He was designed by the former marine biologist, Stephen Hillenburg. Hillenburg based SpongeBob on Bob the Sponge, a character he had created for his educational book "The Intertidal Zone" in the late 1980s.

SpongeBob is a childish, joyful, and clumsy sea sponge who lives in a pineapple with his pet snail Gary in the underwater city of Bikini Bottom. He works as a fry cook at the Krusty Krab, a job which he is exceptionally skilled at and enjoys thoroughly. He attends Mrs. Puff's Boating School, and his greatest dream in life is to receive his boating license. Unfortunately, he tenses up whenever he has to drive a boatmobile, and he drives recklessly. SpongeBob is very good-natured and loves to hang out with his best friend Patrick. His driving teacher is Mrs. Puff and his boss is Mr. Krabs.

In The SpongeBob Musical, SpongeBob's exact species of sea sponge is identified: Aplysina fistularis, a yellow sea sponge who's commonly found in open waters.[9]

SpongeBob or some other form of him appears or is mentioned in every episode of the series, beginning with the series' pilot episode "Help Wanted." He is voiced by Tom Kenny, who is married to Karen Plankton's voice actress, Jill Talley.


Contents
1 Production details
2 Biography
3 Description
3.1 Health
4 Personality
5 Abilities and talents
6 Weaknesses
7 Family
8 Occupation
9 Reception
10 Multiverse
11 Appearances in other media
12 Trivia
13 External links
14 References
Production details

SpongeBob is a poriferan, better known as a sea sponge. In this promo art, he is shown with his scientific classification.


SpongeBob with his real-life counterpart, as seen in the book Underwater Friends.

While Stephen Hillenburg worked as a teacher of marine science at the Ocean Institute in California, he authored an educational book called The Intertidal Zone. The book was intended for children and taught about the behaviors of different sea creatures. Bob the Sponge, a natural sea sponge with sunglasses, was the "host" of the book.

Hillenburg revisited the concept of The Intertidal Zone in 1996 when he started sketching concepts for a cartoon series about undersea life. He wanted the title character to be an under-represented creature, with the rest of the main characters being iconic and easily recognizable sea animals: a crab, a whale, and a starfish. "What's the weirdest animal? The sponge came to mind," he recalled in 2012.[10] As he drew a sea sponge character, he originally wanted to use the shape of a natural sponge, but later decided that a "squeaky-clean square" would better portray a nerdy personality.

An early colored sketch portrayed SpongeBob as wearing a red hat with a green base and a white business shirt with a tie. SpongeBob's look gradually progressed to brown pants that were used in the final design. SpongeBob was designed to be a kid-like character who was goofy and optimistic in a style similar to that made famous by Jerry Lewis.[11]

The character was originally going to be named "SpongeBo