Subduction Zones Map

Last updated 11 October 2026

What the map shows

Subduction Subduction zone. Where one plate sinks under another and back into the mantle, usually marked by a deep ocean trench. Source happens at convergent boundaries where at least one side is ocean floor. The denser plate bends down into the mantle and leaves a trench Ocean trench. A long, narrow trough in the sea floor, 8 to 10 km deep, where one plate bends down under another. Source , which USGS says is typically 8 to 10 km deep. The Nazca Plate sinking under South America at the Peru-Chile Trench, for example, built the Andes. The PB2002 model labels each boundary step with a class, and the solid blue lines are every step it marks as a subduction zone. Other convergent boundaries, where plates collide without one clearly sinking, are dotted.

Most of the lines trace the rim of the Pacific Ocean, the belt often called the Ring of Fire. Shorter ones sit in the Caribbean, the South Sandwich Islands in the far South Atlantic and the Mediterranean.

Key facts

1. PB2002 flags 51,309 km of boundary as subduction zone, 56% of all convergent boundary. Bird (2003)
2. 46 pairs of plates meet at a subduction zone. The longest is Nazca and South American, at 4,297 km.
3. The mean speed across subduction zones is 62.3 mm/yr, faster than any other boundary class.
4. The fastest subduction pair on average is Tonga and Pacific, at 189.9 mm/yr (19.0 cm/yr).
5. Ocean trenches, the surface mark of subduction, are typically 8 to 10 km deep. USGS, Understanding plate motions
6. Cascadia: the Juan de Fuca Plate, a remnant of the larger Farallon Plate, sinks beneath North America off Oregon and Washington. PB2002 traces 1,415 km of it. USGS, What is a tectonic plate?

Cascadia

Off the coast of Oregon and Washington the small Juan de Fuca Plate dives under North America. USGS explains it as what is left of the much larger Farallon Plate, most of which has already sunk beneath the continent. In PB2002 this boundary is 1,415 km long and closes at a mean 40.2 mm/yr. The volcanoes of the Cascade Range, inland from it, are fed by the sinking plate.

All subduction zones by plate pair

Every pair of plates with a subduction boundary in PB2002, longest first. Sort by any column.

Data source: PB2002 plate model, Bird (2003), converted by Hugo Ahlenius, Nordpil, ODC-By 1.0. Download: GeoJSON .

Longest unbroken subduction zones

Data source: PB2002 plate model, Bird (2003), converted by Hugo Ahlenius, Nordpil, ODC-By 1.0.

See all three boundary types on the plate boundaries map, how fast each plate moves on the plate motion map, or every plate on the tectonic plates map.