New 20 Gallon Long

[tjorge98]

Hello,
I am interested in getting a fish tank and I wanted to ask what types of fish i should get.  It is going to be a 20 gallon long, and I am interested in filling it with a lot of different colors and different species.  I don't really want a saltwater tank, so can you guys recommend any freshwater fish for my future tank?

 

[Ninjouzata]

Hiya

Is your water soft or hard? What is your pH? It'd be good to know those before we recommend any fish. You can get these tested at your LFS usually, be sure to ask for specific numbers and that they're using a liquid test kit.
You may also find the information on your water companies website or you can test for it yourself with your own test kit, which is something you'll need to have anyways.
 
Have you decided how you're going to cycle the tank? It's highly recommended to do a fish-less cycle with ammonia. HERE is more info on how to do that. You can get ammonia at Ace Hardware.
You'll also need a test kit like I mentioned. API is a popular brand for this. Here is what the master test kit looks like, which includes pH, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate. Unfortunately the gh and kh test is separate.

 

 

[tjorge98]

The water in my area is pretty hard, and the pH is actually really close to neutral.  I was planning on cycling it with one or two hardy fish, but I will look into fish-less cycling.