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The average depth of the oceans is about 4 km. More precisely the average depth is 3,688 meters (12,100 ft). [72] Nearly half of the world's marine waters are over 3,000 meters (9,800 ft) deep. [27] "Deep ocean," which is anything below 200 meters (660 ft), covers about 66% of Earth's surface. [87]
GEBCO is the only intergovernmental body with a mandate to map the whole ocean floor. At the beginning of the project, only 6 per cent of the world's ocean bottom had been surveyed to today's standards; as of June 2022, the project had recorded 23.4 per cent mapped. About 14,500,000 square kilometres (5,600,000 sq mi) of new bathymetric data ...
There are about 50,000 km (31,000 mi) of oceanic trenches worldwide, mostly around the Pacific Ocean, but also in the eastern Indian Ocean and a few other locations. The greatest ocean depth measured is in the Challenger Deep of the Mariana Trench , at a depth of 10,994 m (36,070 ft) below sea level .
Its average depth is 4,280 m (14,040 ft; 2,340 fathoms), putting the total water volume at roughly 710,000,000 km 3 (170,000,000 cu mi). [ 1 ] Due to the effects of plate tectonics , the Pacific Ocean is currently shrinking by roughly 2.5 cm (1 in) per year on three sides, roughly averaging 0.52 km 2 (0.20 sq mi) a year.
Bathymeric charts showcase depth using a series of lines and points at equal intervals, called depth contours or isobaths (a type of contour line). A closed shape with increasingly smaller shapes inside of it can indicate an ocean trench or a seamount, or underwater mountain, depending on whether the depths increase or decrease going inward.
Changes in glacial-interglacial cycles are at least partially affected by changes in glacier distributions across the Earth. The depth of the ocean basins is a function of the age of oceanic lithosphere (the tectonic plates beneath the floors of the world's oceans). As older plates age, they become denser and sink, allowing newer plates to rise ...
Therefore, mean depth figures are not available for many deep lakes in remote locations. [9] The average lake on Earth has the mean depth 41.8 meters (137.14 feet) [9] The Caspian Sea ranks much further down the list on mean depth, as it has a large continental shelf (significantly larger than the oceanic basin that contains its greatest depths).
This flattened spheroid, combined with local gravity anomalies, defines the geoid of the Earth, which approximates the local mean sea level for locations in the open ocean. The geoid includes a significant depression in the Indian Ocean , whose surface dips as much as 106 m (348 ft) below the global mean sea level (excluding minor effects such ...