List of tectonic plates
This is a list of tectonic plates on Earth. Tectonic plates are pieces of the Earth's crust and uppermost mantle, together referred to as the lithosphere. The plates are around 100 km (60 miles) 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 basaltic rocks ("mafic") dominating oceanic crust, while continental crust consists principally of lower density granitic rocks ("felsic").
The surface of the Earth consists of 14 major plates and 38 minor ones, for a total of 52 plates.
Current plates
Major plates
- African Plate
- Antarctic Plate
- Arabian Plate
- Australian Plate (sometimes merged with the Indian Plate into the Indo-Australian Plate)
- Caribbean Plate
- Cocos Plate
- Eurasian Plate
- Indian Plate (sometimes merged with the Australian Plate into the Indo-Australian Plate)
- Juan de Fuca Plate
- Nazca Plate
- North American Plate
- Pacific Plate
- Philippine Plate
- South American Plate
Minor plates
- Aegean Sea Plate
- Altiplano Plate
- Amurian Plate
- Anatolian Plate
- Balmoral Reef Plate
- Banda Sea Plate
- Bird's Head Plate
- Burma Plate
- Caroline Plate
- Conway Reef Plate
- Easter Plate
- Futuna Plate
- Galapagos Plate
- Hellenic Plate
- Iranian Plate
- Juan Fernandez Plate
- Kermadec Plate
- Manus Plate
- Maoke Plate
- Mariana Plate
- Molucca Sea Plate
- New Hebrides Plate
- Niuafo'ou Plate
- North Andes Plate
- North Bismarck Plate
- Okhotsk Plate
- Okinawa Plate
- Panama Plate
- Rivera Plate
- Sandwich Plate
- Scotia Plate
- Shetland Plate
- Solomon Sea Plate
- Somali Plate
- South Bismarck Plate
- Sunda Plate
- Timor Plate
- Tonga Plate
- Woodlark Plate
- Yangtze Plate
Plates within orogens
Some models identify more minor plates within current orogens.
Ancient plates
- Baltic Plate
- Bellingshausen Plate
- Charcot Plate
- Cimmerian Plate
- Farallon Plate
- Insular Plate
- Intermontane Plate
- Izanagi Plate
- Kula Plate
- Lhasa Plate
- Phoenix Plate
References
- Bird, P. (2003) An updated digital model of plate boundaries also available as a large (13 Mib) PDF file