The father of the Griffin family is loud, rude, not very smart, enjoys drinking beer and generally causes trouble for himself.
The stay-at-home mother is often disappointed with her husband but still loves him and tries to undo the damage he's made.
The eldest child and only daughter is self-conscious and often treated with contempt, as an outcast and abused by her family.
The second child is overweight, very emotional, slow-witted and afraid of an evil monkey that lives in his closet.
A baby which behaves like an adult most of the time, speaks with an upper-class tone and is continuously trying to kill his mother.
Brian is the family's intelligent, talking anthropomorphic dog who frequently points out flaws in Peter's ideas.
Quagmire is the Griffin's sex-addicted neighbor and one of Peter's close friends.
A mild-mannered friend of Peter's who owns and runs a deli. There is a spin-off show based on this character called "The Cleveland Show."
A good friend and neighbor of Peters is Joe, a paraplegic police officer, who has severe anger management issues.
The irresponsible major of the fictional city of Quahog, voiced by the actor Adam West, is a highly eccentric, paranoid politician.