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We examined the effects of 10 microalgal diets on a range of productivity‐related parameters of Bestiolina similis. The diets tested included four monoalgal diets: Tahitian strain Isochrysis sp. (T‐Iso), Pavlova salina (Pav), Tetraselmis chuii (Tet) and the diatom Chaetoceros muelleri (Chaet), five binary diets: Tet+Pav, T‐Iso+Tet, T‐Iso+Pav, Chaet+Tet and Chaet+Pav and a tri‐algal diet: T‐Iso+Tet+Pav. Except for sex ratio, microalgal diets significantly affected all parameters examined (P<0.05). The shortest egg incubation time was found for the tri‐algal diet treatment (1.91±0.04 days) while the longest (2.41±0.09 days) was from the monoalgal diet Tet. Survival at the naupliar stage ranged from the highest of 86.3±1.0% for the tri‐algal diet to a complete mortality for the Tet diet. Naupliar survival was consistently higher than that of copepodite stages for all diets examined and ranged from 86.3±1.0% for the tri‐algal diet to a complete mortality for the Tet diet. Copepodite survival was the highest for the T‐Iso treatment (69.0±4.3%) while Chaet+Tet produced the lowest survival (8.8±1.2%). Sex ratio of B. similis was strongly skewed towards females. Adult female life expectancy was highly dependent on diet. The shortest lifespan (3.1±0.3 days) of the Tet treatment was only about half of that of Pav (6.3±0.6 days) and the tri‐algal diet (5.9±0.4 days). Daily egg production during female lifespan was generally lower on the first day, but peaked over the subsequent days before decreasing towards the end of their lifespan. The highest total egg output over female lifespan was produced by the tri‐algal diet (156.0±11.5 eggs female−1), while the lowest output came from the diet Tet (20.7±2.8 eggs female−1).

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