Where am ILOCATED

African Plate

The African Plate is the second-largest of the 52 plates in the PB2002 plate model, covering 58.5 million km² (22.6 million sq mi), or 11.5% of Earth’s surface. Most of Africa, apart from the east of the continent beyond the East African Rift, with the surrounding floor of the Atlantic and Indian oceans.

African Plate on the globe, with its boundaries coloured by typeAfrican PlateSouth American PlateSomali PlateArabian PlateAnatolian Plate
African Plate Convergent Divergent Transform
Area
58.5 million km² (22.6 million sq mi)
Share of Earth’s surface
11.5%
Speed across the plate
1.6 to 3.2 cm a year (0.6 to 1.2 in)
Direction at its center
Toward the northeast
Length of its edges
41,790 km (25,970 mi)
Neighboring plates
8
Edges by type
18% convergent · 49% divergent · 34% transform
Volcanoes on it
62 active in the past ~12,000 years
What plate am I on?All tectonic plates

What happens at its edges

Geologists often call this the Nubian Plate, because East Africa is slowly splitting away on the Somali Plate along the East African Rift, a few millimeters a year. The rift valleys, lakes and volcanoes of Ethiopia, Kenya and Tanzania mark that slow break-up.

To the north it converges with Eurasia across the Mediterranean, the cause of earthquakes and volcanoes in Italy and Greece. Spreading ridges border it to the west, in the Atlantic, and to the south.

How fast it moves, and which way

At its center (0.4°S, 2.7°E) the African Plate moves about 3.1 cm (1.2 in) a year toward the northeast. Because a plate turns around a pole rather than sliding in a straight line, the speed changes across it: from 1.6 cm (0.6 in) a year to 3.2 cm (1.2 in) a year, with an area-weighted average of 2.8 cm a year. That average makes it the 34th fastest of the 52 plates.

These figures are measured against the average motion of all the plates together (the “no-net-rotation” frame), which is how plate speeds are usually quoted. Measured against the Eurasian Plate instead, the African Plate moves about 0.7 cm (0.3 in) a year toward the northeast at its center.

In the model it rotates about a pole at 49.8°N, 74.6°W at 0.283° per million years. The speeds are averages over years to millions of years of measurement; earthquakes move the ground near a boundary in sudden steps instead.

Neighboring plates and boundaries

Its edges run for 41,790 km (25,970 mi): 18% convergent, where plates move together; 49% divergent, where they move apart; and 34% transform, where they slide past each other. It sinks beneath the Eurasian Plate, Aegean Sea Plate and Anatolian Plate at subduction zones. The Eurasian Plate sinks beneath it.

NeighborShared edgeBoundary typesRelative speed
South American Plate14,970 km (9,300 mi)Divergent 55% · Transform 45%3.2 cm a yearup to 3.4 cm
Somali Plate9,040 km (5,620 mi)Divergent 55% · Transform 23% · Convergent 23%0.3 cm a yearup to 0.6 cm
Eurasian Plate5,540 km (3,440 mi)Convergent 60% · Transform 26% · Divergent 14%0.6 cm a yearup to 0.9 cm
North American Plate4,000 km (2,490 mi)Divergent 74% · Transform 26%2.3 cm a yearup to 2.5 cm
Antarctic Plate3,300 km (2,050 mi)Transform 55% · Divergent 45%1.4 cm a yearup to 1.4 cm
Arabian Plate3,160 km (1,960 mi)Divergent 63% · Transform 23% · Convergent 14%1.4 cm a yearup to 2.1 cm
Aegean Sea Plate1,070 km (670 mi)Convergent 100%3.8 cm a yearup to 3.8 cm
Anatolian Plate700 km (440 mi)Convergent 68% · Transform 32%1.4 cm a yearup to 1.8 cm

Relative speed is how fast the two plates move against each other along their shared edge, averaged over its length.

Countries and territories on the African Plate

34 lie entirely on it; the other 20 are split between plates. The share is the part of each country’s land on this plate.

Volcanoes on the African Plate

The Smithsonian Global Volcanism Program lists 62 volcanoes on this plate that have been active in roughly the past 12,000 years. The most recent eruptions on record:

Where the edges are blurred

Parts of this plate lie in the Alps and west central Atlantic zones, which the model marks as broad belts of deformation rather than sharp plate edges. There the motion between plates is spread over many faults, and a single boundary line is a simplification.

Sources

Outline, area, boundary types and motion: Bird, P. (2003), An updated digital model of plate boundaries, Geochemistry Geophysics Geosystems, 4(3), 1027, doi:10.1029/2001GC000252. Released by its author into the public domain (CC0 1.0). Areas are the model’s published figures; speeds, directions, boundary lengths and countries are calculated from its outlines, boundary steps and rotation poles.

Volcanoes: Global Volcanism Program, Smithsonian Institution, Volcanoes of the World (v. 5.4.0). Country outlines: Natural Earth.