There are 7 bones in a giraffe's neck. Like nearly all mammals, giraffes have seven cervical vertebrae, even though each vertebra can be unusually long and the neck may measure about 2 metres.
The giraffe's neck evolved through the same basic seven-bone framework found in humans, mice, whales, and most other mammals. Instead of adding more vertebrae, evolution lengthened the existing ones and modified their joints, muscles, and blood vessels. A giraffe's neck is therefore remarkable mainly because of the size and shape of its vertebrae, not their number.
A common mix-up is confusing the neck's seven vertebrae with the giraffe's total vertebrae or with the number of bones in its entire skeleton. Another misconception is that every long-necked animal has more neck bones; swans, for example, have many more cervical vertebrae, while mammals generally retain seven. The giraffe's powerful heart and specialized blood vessels also help move blood through this unusually elevated neck.