Aquaculture continues to grow to meet the consumption of an increasing world population. The consumption of the principle terrestrial meat species: beef, lamb, pork and chicken is often compared to aquaculture which consists of at least 20 species, many in the early stages of domestication and breeding. B reeding programmes for farmed aquatic species will gain much from implementation of good practice developed in terrestrial species for pedigree selection, statistical analysis, control of inbreeding, sib selection and selection indexes. But aquaculture breeding has to move quickly to meet the expectation of consumers and retailers in quality, health and welfare. Genome editing offers the opportunity to make targeted changes in the genetic sequence, introducing variation that will result in major improvements in performance health and welfare. Such variation exists at a low level in the wild, but genome editing allows fast and effective introduction of favorable variants into the emerging farmed aquatic species making them better adapted to the farm environment. Where favourable legislation and consumer demand exists, aquaculture breeders should identify genes and variation that improve health, welfare and performance, and employ genome editing to develop strains that are more sustainable. Research is underway to use genome editing to give better control of sex and sterility to prevent escapees breeding in the wild, disease resistance to control disease and improve the production efficiency of high quality, farmed fish.