List of tectonic plates

Short description: none

Map of Earth's 16 principal tectonic plates.[1]

Types of plate boundary:

Convergent

Collision zone

Subduction zone

Divergent

Extension zone

Spreading center

Transform

Dextral transform

Sinistral transform

Plate tectonics map from NASA

This is a list of tectonic plates on Earth's surface. Tectonic plates are pieces of Earth's crust and uppermost mantle, together referred to as the lithosphere. The plates are around 100 km (62 mi) thick and consist of two principal types of material: oceanic crust (also called sima from silicon and magnesium) and continental crust (sial from silicon and aluminium). The composition of the two types of crust differs markedly, with mafic basaltic rocks dominating oceanic crust, while continental crust consists principally of lower-density felsic granitic rocks.

## Contents

* 1 Current plates
* 1.1 Major plates
* 1.2 Minor plates
* 1.3 Microplates
* 2 Ancient tectonic plates
* 2.1 African plate
* 2.2 Antarctic plate
* 2.3 Eurasian plate
* 2.4 Indo-Australian plate
* 2.5 North American plate
* 2.6 South American plate
* 3 See also
* 4 Notes and references
* 4.1 Notes
* 4.2 References
* 4.3 Bibliography
* 5 External links

## Current plates

Geologists generally agree that the following tectonic plates currently exist on Earth's surface with roughly definable boundaries. Tectonic plates are sometimes subdivided into three fairly arbitrary categories: major (or primary) plates, minor (or secondary) plates, and microplates (or tertiary plates).[2]

### Major plates

Map showing Earth's principal tectonic plates and their boundaries in detail

These plates comprise the bulk of the continents and the Pacific Ocean. For purposes of this list, a major plate is any plate with an area greater than 20 million km2 (7.7 million sq mi).

* Earth:African plate - Tectonic plate underlying Africa – 61,300,000 km2 (23,700,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Antarctic plate - Major tectonic plate containing Antarctica and the surrounding ocean floor – 60,900,000 km2 (23,500,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Eurasian plate - Tectonic plate which includes most of Eurasia – 67,800,000 km2 (26,200,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Indo-Australian plate - Major tectonic plate formed by the fusion of the Indian and Australian plates (sometimes considered to be two separate tectonic plates) – 58,900,000 km2 (22,700,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Australian plate - Major tectonic plate – 47,000,000 km2 (18,000,000 sq mi)
* Earth:North American plate - Large tectonic plate including most of North America, Greenland and part of Siberia – 75,900,000 km2 (29,300,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Pacific plate - Oceanic tectonic plate under the Pacific Ocean – 103,300,000 km2 (39,900,000 sq mi)
* Earth:South American plate - Major tectonic plate – 43,600,000 km2 (16,800,000 sq mi)

### Minor plates

These smaller plates are often not shown on major plate maps, as the majority of them do not comprise significant land area. For purposes of this list, a minor plate is any plate with an area less than 20 million km2 (7.7 million sq mi) but greater than 1 million km2 (0.39 million sq mi).

* Earth:Amur plate - Minor tectonic plate in eastern Asia
* Earth:Arabian plate - Minor tectonic plate – 5,000,000 km2 (1,900,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Burma plate - Minor tectonic plate in Southeast Asia – 1,100,000 km2 (420,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Caribbean plate - Tectonic plate in Central America and the Caribbean – 3,300,000 km2 (1,300,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Caroline plate - Minor oceanic tectonic plate north of New Guinea – 1,700,000 km2 (660,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Cocos plate - Young oceanic tectonic plate beneath the Pacific Ocean off the west coast of Central America – 2,900,000 km2 (1,100,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Indian plate - Minor plate that separated from Gondwana – 11,900,000 km2 (4,600,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Nazca plate - Oceanic tectonic plate in the eastern Pacific Ocean basin – 15,600,000 km2 (6,000,000 sq mi)[note 1]
* Earth:New Hebrides plate - Minor Pacific Ocean tectonic plate – 1,100,000 km2 (420,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Philippine Sea plate - Oceanic tectonic plate to the east of the Philippines – 5,500,000 km2 (2,100,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Scotia plate - Minor oceanic tectonic plate between the Antarctic and South American plates – 1,600,000 km2 (620,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Somali plate - Minor tectonic plate including the east coast of Africa and the adjoining seabed – 16,700,000 km2 (6,400,000 sq mi)
* Earth:Sunda plate - Tectonic plate including Southeast Asia
* Earth:Yangtze plate - Tectonic plate carrying the bulk of southern China

### Microplates

These plates are often grouped with an adjacent principal plate on a tectonic plate world map. For purposes of this list, a microplate is any plate with an area less than 1,000,000 km2 (390,000 sq mi). Some models identify more minor plates within current orogens (events that lead to a large structural deformation of Earth's lithosphere) like the Apulian, Explorer, Gorda, and Philippine Mobile Belt plates.[3] The latest studies have shown that microplates are the basic elements of which the crust is composed and that the larger plates are composed of amalgamations of these, and a subdivision of ca. 1200 smaller plates has come forward.[4][5]

The new Global Tectonic Map with the subdivision of the continents, oceans and mobile mountain belts in ca. 1200 smaller plates. Legend: green: terrane (microplate) boundaries in the continental blocks; cyan: terranes of the oceanic plates; orange: terranes inside the mobile belts; blue: oceanic transform faults; red: fault zones in the continental and mountain belt domain; purple: main subduction zones and suture zones; orange dots: volcanoes.

* African plate
* Earth:Lwandle plate - Mainly oceanic tectonic microplate off the southeast coast of Africa
* Earth:Rovuma plate - One of three tectonic microplates that contribute to the Nubian Plate and the Somali Plate
* Earth:Victoria microplate - Tectonic plate in East Africa
* Danakil microplate \- a microplate at the Afar triple junction
* Antarctic plate
* Earth:Shetland plate - Tectonic microplate off the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula
* Australian plate
* Earth:Capricorn plate - Proposed minor tectonic plate under the Indian Ocean
* Earth:Futuna plate - Very small tectonic plate near the south Pacific island of Futuna
* Earth:Kermadec plate - Tectonic plate in the south Pacific Ocean
* Earth:Maoke plate - Small tectonic plate in western New Guinea
* Earth:Tonga plate - Small tectonic plate in the southwest Pacific Ocean
* Earth:Woodlark plate - Small tectonic plate located to the east of the island of New Guinea
* Caribbean plate
* Earth:Gonâve microplate - Part of the boundary between the North American plate and the Caribbean plate
* Earth:Panama plate - Small tectonic plate in Central America
* Cocos plate
* Earth:Rivera plate - Small tectonic plate off the west coast of Mexico
* Eurasian plate
* Earth:Adriatic plate, also known as the Apulian plate - Small tectonic plate in the Mediterranean
* Earth:Aegean Sea plate, also known as Hellenic plate - Small tectonic plate in the eastern Mediterranean Sea
* Earth:Anatolian plate - Continental tectonic plate comprising most of the Anatolian Peninsula (Asia Minor)
* Earth:Banda Sea plate - Minor tectonic plate underlying the Banda Sea in southeast Asia
* Earth:Iberian plate - Small tectonic plate now part of the Eurasian plate
* Earth:Molucca Sea plate - Small fully subducted tectonic plate near Indonesia
* Earth:Halmahera plate - Small tectonic plate in the Molucca Sea
* Earth:Sangihe plate - Microplate within eastern Indonesia
* Earth:Okinawa plate - Minor tectonic plate from the northern end of Taiwan to the southern tip of Kyūshū
* Earth:Pelso plate - Small tectonic unit in the Pannonian Basin in Europe
* Earth:Timor plate - Microplate in Southeast Asia carrying the island of Timor and surrounding islands
* Earth:Tisza plate - Tectonic microplate, in present-day Europe
* Nazca plate
* Earth:Coiba plate - Tectonic plate off the coast south of Panama and northwestern Colombia
* Earth:Malpelo plate - A small tectonic plate off the coast west of Ecuador and Colombia
* North American plate
* Earth:Greenland plate - Supposed tectonic microplate containing the Greenland craton[6]
* Earth:Queen Elizabeth Islands Subplate - Small tectonic plate containing the Queen Elizabeth Islands of Northern Canada
* Pacific plate
* Earth:Balmoral Reef plate - Small tectonic plate in the south Pacific north of Fiji
* Earth:Conway Reef plate - Small tectonic plate in the south Pacific west of Fiji
* Earth:Easter microplate - Very small tectonic plate to the west of Easter Island
* Earth:Galápagos microplate - Very small tectonic plate at the Galápagos triple junction
* Earth:Juan de Fuca plate - Small tectonic plate in the eastern North Pacific – 250,000 km2
* Earth:Explorer plate - Oceanic tectonic plate beneath the Pacific Ocean off the west coast of Vancouver Island, Canada
* Earth:Gorda plate - One of the northern remnants of the Farallon plate
* Earth:Juan Fernández plate - Very small tectonic plate in the southern Pacific Ocean
* Earth:Manus plate - Tiny tectonic plate northeast of New Guinea
* Earth:North Bismarck plate - Small tectonic plate in the Bismarck Sea north of New Guinea
* North Galápagos microplate - Tectonic plate off west South America
* Earth:Solomon Sea plate - Minor tectonic plate near the Solomon Islands archipelago in the Pacific Ocean
* Earth:South Bismarck plate - Small tectonic plate in the southern Bismarck Sea
* Earth:Trobriand plate - Small tectonic plate located to the east of the island of New Guinea
* Philippine Sea plate
* Earth:Mariana plate - Small tectonic plate west of the Mariana Trench
* Earth:Philippine Mobile Belt, also known as Philippine microplate - Tectonic boundary
* Scotia plate
* Earth:South Sandwich plate - Small tectonic plate south of the South American plate
* Somali plate
* Earth:Madagascar plate - Tectonic plate formerly part of the supercontinent Gondwana
* South American plate

## Ancient tectonic plates

In the history of Earth, many tectonic plates have come into existence and have over the intervening years either accreted onto other plates to form larger plates, rifted into smaller plates, or have been crushed by or subducted under other plates.

The following is a list of ancient cratons, microplates, plates, and terranes which no longer exist as separate plates. Cratons are the oldest and most stable parts of the continental lithosphere, and shields are exposed parts of them. Terranes are fragments of crustal material formed on one tectonic plate and accreted to crust lying on another plate, which may or may not have originated as independent microplates: a terrane may not contain the full thickness of the lithosphere.

### African plate

* Earth:Atlantica - Ancient continent formed during the Proterozoic about 2 billion years ago
* Earth:Congo Craton - Precambrian craton that with four others makes up the modern continent of Africa (Angola, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Sudan, and Zambia)
* Earth:Kalahari Craton - African geological area (South Africa)
* Earth:Saharan Metacraton - Large area of continental crust in the north-central part of Africa (Algeria)
* Earth:Tanzania Craton - Old and stable part of the continental lithosphere in central Tanzania (Tanzania)
* Earth:West African Craton - One of the five cratons of the Precambrian basement rock of Africa that make up the African Plate (Algeria, Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, and Togo)
* Zaire Craton (Congo)

### Antarctic plate

* Earth:Bellingshausen plate - Ancient tectonic plate that fused onto the Antarctic plate
* Earth:Charcot plate - Fragment of the Phoenix tectonic plate fused to the Antarctic Peninsula
* Earth:East Antarctic Shield, also known as East Antarctic Craton - Cratonic rock body which makes up most of the continent Antarctica
* Earth:Phoenix plate - Tectonic plate that existed during the early Paleozoic through late Cenozoic time

### Eurasian plate

* Armorica - Microcontinent or group of continental fragments rifted away from Gondwana (France, Germany, Spain and Portugal)
* Earth:Avalonia (Canada, Ireland, Great Britain, and United States)
* Earth:Baltic plate - Ancient tectonic plate from the Cambrian to the Carboniferous Period
* Belomorian Craton
* Central Iberian plate
* Cimmerian plate - Ancient string of microcontinents that rifted from Gondwana (Anatolia, Iran, Afghanistan, Tibet, Indochina and Malaya)
* Earth:East European Craton - Geology of Europe
* Place:Baltic Shield, also known as Fennoscandian Shield - Ancient segment of Earth's crust
* Junggar plate - Geographical subregion in Northwest China and Eastern Kazakhstan
* Earth:Kazakhstania - Geological region in Central Asia and the Junngar Basin in China
* Earth:Lhasa terrane - Fragment of crustal material that forms present-day southern Tibet
* Earth:Massif Central - A highland region in the middle of Southern France
* Moravo Silesian plate
* Earth:Midlands Microcraton - Block of late Neoproterozoic crust which underlies the English Midlands
* Earth:North China Craton - Continental crustal block in China, Inner Mongolia, the Yellow Sea, and North Korea
* Ossa-Morena plate
* Piemont-Liguria plate - Former piece of oceanic crust that is seen as part of the Tethys Ocean
* Proto-Alps terrane
* Rhenohercynian plate - Fold belt of west and central Europe, formed during the Hercynian orogeny
* Siberian Craton - Ancient craton forming the Central Siberian Plateau
* South Portuguese plate
* Tarim craton
* Teplá-Barrandian terrane
* Earth:Ukrainian Shield - The southwest shield of the East European craton
* Valais plate - Subducted ocean basin. Remnants found in the Alps in the North Penninic nappes.
* Volgo-Uralian craton
* Yakutai craton
* Yangtze Craton - An ancient continent that contained today's South and Southeast China, Indochina, and parts of Southeast Asia

### Indo-Australian plate

Basic geological regions of Australia, by age Map of chronostratigraphic divisions of India

* Altjawarra Craton (Australia)
* Aravalli Craton (India)
* Bastar Craton (India)
* Bhandara Craton (India)
* Bundelkhand Craton (India)
* Central Craton (Australia)
* Curnamona Craton (Australia)
* Earth:Gawler Craton - Province of the larger West Australian Shield in central South Australia
* Earth:Pilbara Craton
* Singhbhum Craton (India)
* Earth:Yilgarn Craton - Large craton in Western Australia
* Earth:Australian Shield, also known as Western Australian Shield - Large part of the continent of Australia
* Earth:Zealandia. See Moa plate and Lord Howe Rise

### North American plate

North American cratons and basement rocks

* Earth:Avalonia (Canada, Ireland, Great Britain, and United States)
* Earth:Churchill Craton - Northwest section of the Canadian Shield from southern Saskatchewan and Alberta to northern Nunavut (Canada)
* Earth:Farallon plate - Ancient oceanic plate that has mostly subducted under the North American plate (split into the Cocos, Explorer, Juan de Fuca, Gorda plates, Nazca plate, and Rivera plates)
* Earth:Hearne Craton - Craton in northern Canada (Canada)
* Laurentian Craton, also known as North American Craton - A large continental craton that forms the ancient geological core of the North American continent (Canada and United States)
* Earth:Insular plate - Ancient oceanic plate
* Earth:Intermontane plate - Ancient oceanic tectonic plate on the west coast of North America about 195 million years ago
* Earth:Izanagi plate - Ancient tectonic plate
* Mexican plate
* Earth:Nain Province - Part of the North Atlantic Craton in Labrador, Canada (Canada)
* Newfoundland plate
* Nova Scotia plate
* Earth:Rae Craton - Archean craton in northern Canada north of the Superior Craton (Canada)
* Sask Craton (Canada)
* Earth:Sclavia Craton - Late Archean supercraton (Canada)
* Earth:Slave Craton - Area of ancient rocks in northwest Canada (Canada)
* Earth:Superior Craton - Large crustal block in North America (Canada)

### South American plate

* Earth:Amazonian Craton - Geologic province in South America (Brazil)
* Earth:Río de la Plata Craton - Medium-sized continental block in Uruguay, eastern Argentina and southern Brazil (Argentina and Uruguay)
* Earth:São Francisco Craton - Ancient craton in eastern South America (Brazil)

## See also

* Earth:Asthenosphere
* Earth:Continent
* Earth:Craton
* Platform - A continental area covered by relatively flat or gently tilted, mainly sedimentary strata
* Shield - Large stable area of exposed Precambrian crystalline rock
* Earth:Earth's crust - Earth's outer shell of rock
* Earth:Continental crust - Layer of rock that forms the continents and continental shelves
* Earth:Oceanic crust - Uppermost layer of the oceanic portion of a tectonic plate
* Earth:Earth's mantle - A layer of silicate rock between Earth's crust and its outer core
* Lower mantle - The region from 660 to 2900 km below Earth's surface
* Upper mantle
* Chemistry:Geochemistry
* Earth:Sial
* Sima - Rocks rich in magnesium silicate minerals
* Earth:Hydrosphere
* Earth:Lithosphere - Outermost shell of a terrestrial-type planet or natural satellite
* Earth:Ocean - Body of salt water covering the majority of Earth
* Earth:Plate tectonics - Movement of Earth's lithosphere
* Earth:List of tectonic plate interactions - Movements of Earth's lithosphere
* Earth:Supercontinent - Landmass comprising more than one continental core, or craton

## Notes and references

### Notes

1. ↑ 15,600,000 km2 is the original size before the 2017 split of the Coiba and Malpelo plates.

### References

1. ↑ New Map Shows Earth’s Tectonic Plates In Unprecedented Detail
2. ↑ Madaan, About Sonia (2020-08-18). "7 Major Tectonic Plates (Pacific, African, Eurasian, Antarctic and more)". How Many Tectonic Plates Are on Earth?. https://eartheclipse.com/geology/tectonic-plates.html#How_Many_Tectonic_Plates_Are_on_Earth.
3. ↑ Bird, P. (2003). "An updated digital model of plate boundaries". Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems 4 (3): 1027. doi:10.1029/2001GC000252. http://peterbird.name/publications/2003_PB2002/2003_PB2002.htm.
4. ↑ Hasterok, D., Halpin, J., Collins, A.S., Hand, M., Kreemer, C., Gard, M., and Glorie, S. (2022); New maps of global geological provinces and tectonic plates. Earth Science Reviews, 2022.
5. ↑ van Dijk, J.P. (2023); The New Global Tectonic Map – Analyses and Implications. Terra Nova, 2023, 27 pp. doi:10.1111/TER.12662
6. ↑ Niels Henriksen; A.K. Higgins; Feiko Kalsbeek; T. Christopher R. Pulvertaft (2000). "Greenland from Archaean to Quaternary". Greenland Survey Bulletin (185). http://www.geus.dk/publications/bull-gl/nr185/nr185_p12-24.pdf.

### Bibliography

North Andes plate

* Restrepo, Jorge Julián; Ordóñez Carmona, Oswaldo; Martens, Uwe; Correa, Ana María (2009). "Terrenos, complejos y provincias en la Cordillera Central de Colombia (Terrains, complexes and provinces in the central cordillera of Colombia)". Ingeniería Investigación y Desarrollo 9: 49–56. https://revistas.uptc.edu.co/index.php/ingenieria_sogamoso/article/view/908. Retrieved 2019-10-31.
* Fuck, Reinhardt A.; Brito Neves, Benjamim Bley; Schobbenhaus, Carlos (2008). "Rodinia descendants in South America". Precambrian Research 160: 108–126. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/287701535_From_Rodinia_to_Western_Gondwana_An_approach_to_the_Brasiliano-Pan_African_Cycle_and_orogenic_collage. Retrieved 2019-10-29.
* Cordani, U.G.; Cardona, A.; Jiménez, D.M.; Dunyl, L.; Nutman, A.P. (2003). "Geochronology of Proterozoic basement from the Colombian Andes: Tectonic history of remnants from a fragmented Grenville Belt". 10o Congreso Geológico Chileno. pp. 1–10.
* Restrepo, Jorge Julian; Toussaint, Jean F. (1988). "Terranes and continental accretion in the Colombian Andes". Episodes 11: 189–193. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/279701945_Terranes_and_Continental_Accretion_in_the_Colombian_Andes. Retrieved 2019-10-31.

## External links

* Bird, Peter (2003) An updated digital model of plate boundaries also available as a large (13 Mb) PDF file

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Tectonic plates

Major|

* African
* Indo-Australian Plate
* Australian
* Indian
* Antarctic
* Eurasian
* North American
* Pacific
* South American

Minor|

* Amurian
* Arabian
* Caribbean
* Caroline
* Cocos
* Juan de Fuca
* Nazca
* Okhotsk
* Philippine
* Scotia
* Somali
* Yangtze

Other|

* Adriatic
* Aegean Sea
* Anatolian
* Balmoral Reef
* Banda Sea
* Bird's Head
* Burma
* Capricorn
* Coiba
* Conway Reef
* Easter
* Explorer
* Futuna
* Galapagos
* Gonâve
* Gorda
* Greenland
* Halmahera
* Iberian
* Iranian
* Juan Fernández
* Kerguelen
* Kermadec
* Madagascar
* Malpelo
* Manus
* Maoke
* Mariana
* Molucca Sea
* New Hebrides
* Niuafo’ou
* North Andes
* North Bismarck
* North Galapagos
* Nubian
* Okinawa
* Panama
* Pelso
* Philippine Mobile Belt
* Rivera
* Sangihe
* Seychelles
* Shetland
* Solomon Sea
* South Bismarck
* South Sandwich
* Sunda
* Timor
* Tisza
* Tonga
* Woodlark

Historical|

* Baltic
* Bellingshausen
* Charcot
* Cimmeria
* Farallon
* Insular
* Intermontane
* Izanagi
* Kula
* Lhasa
* Malvinas
* Moa
* Phoenix

* List
* Category
* Earth science
* Commons

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