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).[1]
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.
African Plate – Tectonic plate underlying Africa – 61,300,000 km2
Antarctic Plate – Major tectonic plate containing Antarctica and the surrounding ocean floor – 60,900,000 km2
Eurasian Plate – Tectonic plate which includes most of the continent of Eurasia – 67,800,000 km2
Indo-Australian Plate – A major tectonic plate formed by the fusion of the Indian and the Australian Plates (sometimes considered to be two separate tectonic plates) – 58,900,000 km2
Indian Plate – A minor tectonic plate that got separated from Gondwana – 11,900,000 km2
North American Plate – Large tectonic plate including most of North America, Greenland and part of Siberia – 75,900,000 km2
Pacific Plate – Oceanic tectonic plate under the Pacific Ocean – 103,300,000 km2
South American Plate – Major tectonic plate which includes most of South America and a large part of the south Atlantic – 43,600,000 km2
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 but greater than 1 million km2.
Amurian Plate – A minor tectonic plate in eastern Asia
Arabian Plate – Minor tectonic plate – 5,000,000 km2
Burma Plate – Minor tectonic plate in Southeast Asia – 1,100,000 km2
Caribbean Plate – A mostly oceanic tectonic plate including part of Central America and the Caribbean Sea – 3,300,000 km2
Caroline Plate – Minor oceanic tectonic plate north of New Guinea – 1,700,000 km2
Cocos Plate – Young oceanic tectonic plate beneath the Pacific Ocean off the west coast of Central America – 2,900,000 km2
Nazca Plate – Oceanic tectonic plate in the eastern Pacific Ocean basin – 15,600,000 km2[note 1]
New Hebrides Plate – Minor tectonic plate in the Pacific Ocean near Vanuatu – 1,100,000 km2
Philippine Sea Plate – Oceanic tectonic plate to the east of the Philippines – 5,500,000 km2
Scotia Plate – Minor oceanic tectonic plate between the South American and Antarctic Plates – 1,600,000 km2
Somali Plate – Minor tectonic plate including the east coast of Africa and the adjoining seabed – 16,700,000 km2
Sunda Plate – Tectonic plate including Southeast Asia
Yangtze Plate – Small 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 million km2. 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. New research has shown that microplates may be the basic elements of which the crust is composed.
[2][3]
A possible interpretation of the tectonic framework of Earth, in which the entire planet (even parts which are traditionally fixed in major plates) is divided into 1180 microplates and terranes. 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
Adriatic Plate, also known as the Apulian Plate – A small tectonic plate in the Mediterranean
Lwandle Plate – Mainly oceanic tectonic microplate off the southeast coast of Africa
Rovuma Plate – One of three tectonic microplates that contribute to the Nubian Plate and the Somali Plate
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
Atlantica – Ancient continent formed during the Proterozoic about 2 billion years ago
Avalonia – Microcontinent in the Paleozoic era named for the Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland (Canada, Great Britain, and United States)
Carolina Plate – Exotic terrane from central Georgia to central Virginia in the United States
Churchill Craton – Northwest section of the Canadian Shield from southern Saskatchewan and Alberta to northern Nunavut (Canada)
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)
Florida Plate – Overview of the geology of the U.S. state of Florida (United States)
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)
^Niels Henriksen; A.K. Higgins; Feiko Kalsbeek; T. Christopher R. Pulvertaft (2000). "Greenland from Archaean to Quaternary"(PDF). Greenland Survey Bulletin. No. 185. Archived from the original(PDF) on 2008-12-07. Retrieved 2009-10-04.
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.
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