A beaver tail liver, often referred to as a sliver of liver, is an anatomical variant of the left liver lobe, in which the left lobe is long and extends laterally to encircle the spleen. It affects women more frequently. The only clinical significance that it is more vulnerable to injury after trauma to the left upper quadrant or lower left chest, otherwise, its parenchyma is normal and consequently has the same risks of hepatic pathology as the rest of the liver.

It could be challenging to distinguish between the liver and spleen when they have the same echogenicity on ultrasound or identical density on CT. Even though they have a different density or echogenicity, it could be misinterpreted for a splenic mass or a perisplenic/subcapsular hemorrhage.