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The brain has persistent internal states that can modulate every aspect of an animal’s mental experience^{, , –}. In complex tasks such as foraging, the internal state is dynamic^{, , –}. Caenorhabditis elegans alternate between local search and global dispersal. Rodents and primates exhibit trade-offs between exploitation and exploration^,. However, fundamental questions remain about how persistent states are maintained in the brain, which upstream networks drive state transitions and how state-encoding neurons exert neuromodulatory effects on sensory perception and decision-making to govern appropriate behaviour. Here, using tracking microscopy to monitor whole-brain neuronal activity at cellular resolution in freely moving zebrafish larvae, we show that zebrafish spontaneously alternate between two persistent internal states during foraging for live prey (Paramecia). In the exploitation state, the animal inhibits …