Ring of Fire

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Map of the Pacific Ring of Fire highlighting the tectonic plate boundaries around the Pacific Ocean. The map shows spreading and converging plate boundaries, volcanic arcs, and marks major active volcanoes with star symbols. A pink shaded area outlines the Ring of Fire, tracing the regions of frequent earthquakes and volcanic activity along the edges of the Pacific Plate, including the west coasts of the Americas, eastern Asia, and the islands of the western Pacific.

Thick dark smoke rises from erupting Anak Krakatau volcano in Indonesia, with a small boat floating on the calm water in the foreground.

Thick smoke billows from the summit of Tungurahua volcano, rising above green slopes and farmland in Ecuador.

World map displaying the locations of volcanoes and thermal fields that have been active in the past 10,000 years, marked with red dots. Dense clusters are visible along the Pacific Ring of Fire, including the west coasts of the Americas, eastern Asia, and island arcs in the Pacific, as well as scattered sites in the Mediterranean, East Africa, and the Atlantic.

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Also called:: Circum-Pacific Belt or Pacific Ring of Fire

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Ring of Fire

Q: What geological features are associated with the Ring of Fire?

The Ring of Fire, named for its association with the belt of numerous volcanoes found throughout its length, also coincides with chains of island arcs and arc-shaped geomorphic features, such as Tonga , the Indonesian archipelago, the Philippines , Japan and the Kuril Islands , the Rocky Mountains and coastal mountain ranges of western North America , and the Andes Mountains .

Q: What tectonic plates are involved in the Ring of Fire?

The Ring of Fire surrounds several of Earth’s tectonic plates, including the Philippine, Juan de Fuca, Cocos, and Nazca plates, along with three sides of the massive Pacific Plate. It is also found along the boundaries of several other plates, including the North American, South American, Eurasian, and the Indian-Australian (or Indo-Australian) Plates.

Q: What significant events have occurred in the Ring of Fire?

The Ring of Fire is a band of enormous amounts of seismic and volcanic activity. Significant explosive volcanic events include the eruptions of Mount Tambora (1815), Krakatoa (1883), Novarupta (1912), Mount Pinatubo (1991), and the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai (2022), along with dozens of smaller events. The epicenters of several of Earth’s major earthquakes —such as the Chile earthquake of 1960 , the Alaska earthquake of 1964 , and the Japan earthquake and tsunami of 2011 —are located in the Ring of Fire.

seismic belt

Also known as: Circum-Pacific Belt, Circum-Pacific Volcano Belt, Pacific Ring of Fire(Show More)

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What geological features are associated with the Ring of Fire?

What tectonic plates are involved in the Ring of Fire?

What significant events have occurred in the Ring of Fire?

Ring of Fire, the world’s largest seismically active belt of earthquake epicentres, volcanoes, and tectonic plate boundaries that fringes the Pacific basin. For much of its 40,000-km (24,900-mile) length, the horseshoe-shaped belt coincides with chains of island arcs—(which occur at convergent plate boundaries, see plate tectonics) such as Tonga and New Hebrides, the Indonesian archipelago, the Philippines, Japan, the Kuril Islands, and the Aleutians—as well as other arc-shaped geomorphic features, such as the western coast of North America and the Andes Mountains.

Volcanoes are associated with the belt throughout its length; for this reason it is called the “Ring of Fire.” A series of deep ocean troughs frame the belt on the oceanic side, and continental landmasses lie behind. Most of the world’s earthquakes, the overwhelming majority of the world’s strongest earthquakes, and approximately 75 percent of the world’s volcanoes occur within the Ring of Fire.

Geologic context

The Ring of Fire surrounds several tectonic plates, including the vast Pacific Plate and the smaller Philippine, Juan de Fuca, Cocos, and Nazca plates. Many of these oceanic tectonic plates converge with and subduct under the continental plates they border. Stresses generated by rock-against-rock compression creates substantial seismic activity that results in earthquakes and underwater landslides, In addition, melting stemming from the descent of the subducting plate into the asthenosphere produces magma that drives volcanic eruptions. Along much of the western coast of North America, however, the Pacific Plate is sliding past the North American plate at plate intersections called transform faults, which produce earthquakes but few volcanic eruptions.

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Significant volcanic and seismic events

This belt has been the site of several major volcanic eruptions and earthquakes within the most recent three centuries. Major volcanic events that have occurred within the Ring of Fire since 1800 included the eruptions of Mount Tambora (1815), Krakatoa (1883), Novarupta (1912), Mount Saint Helens (1980), Mount Ruiz (1985), and Mount Pinatubo (1991). The Ring of Fire has been the setting for several of the largest earthquakes in recorded history, including the Chile earthquake of 1960, the Alaska earthquake of 1964, the Chile earthquake of 2010, and the Japan earthquake of 2011 as well as the earthquake that produced the devastating Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia BritannicaThis article was most recently revised and updated by John P. Rafferty.

Ring of Fire

What geological features are associated with the Ring of Fire?

What tectonic plates are involved in the Ring of Fire?

What significant events have occurred in the Ring of Fire?

Geologic context

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Significant volcanic and seismic events