The fastest animal on Earth isn't a cheetah — it's a bird in a dive

A peregrine falcon can't outrun a cheetah in level flight, but in a hunting dive called a stoop, it tucks its wings and free-falls toward prey at over 320 km/h (200 mph) — faster than any other animal moves under its own power. The dive ends in a strike that can kill on impact, before the falcon even needs to grab hold.

— Ken Franklin, GPS-tracked stoop velocity of a trained peregrine falcon — falconry speed trials, 1999