Ocean Floor Map

Palk Strait depth map

Strait: average depth about 6 m, deepest 27 m (GEBCO_2026 grid).

Tap or scroll to load the interactive map

Sea level todayDrag the slider to lower the sea and see the land that would appear.

Sea level in metres below today’s. A simple bathtub model: it lowers the sea everywhere by the same amount and does not simulate how the water would really drain.

Key

Sea depth

  • Deeper than 6,000 m
  • 4,000 to 6,000 m
  • 2,000 to 4,000 m
  • 1,000 to 2,000 m
  • 200 to 1,000 m
  • Shallower than 200 m (the continental shelf)

Land height

  • Land up to 500 m
  • 500 to 2,000 m
  • Above 2,000 m

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  • Seabed exposed when the sea is lowered A dashed white line marks today’s coast.

How to read the map. Darker blue is deeper water. Tap anywhere to see how deep the sea is there, or how high the land is, and the nearest named undersea feature. Depths come from the GEBCO_2026 grid, which in most of the deep ocean is predicted from satellite measurements of the sea surface rather than surveyed by ship, and the map’s tiles are coarser than the grid, so narrow trenches read shallower on the map than their true depth. Not for navigation.

Palk Strait at a glance

  • 6 maverage depth
  • 6 mmedian depth
  • 27 mmaximum depth
  • 13,245 km²water area

Palk Strait is a strait. It is very shallow: nowhere in it is deeper than a few tens of metres in the grid. Inside its outline the GEBCO grid has about 13,245 km² of water, with an average depth of about 6 m (the middle value is 6 m) and a maximum of 27 m, found at 9.34° N, 79.74° E.

Open the map at the deepest cell and tap to read the depth.

How deep is each part of the Palk Strait?

The bar splits the Palk Strait's water by depth. Each colour is a depth band, and the shares add up to 100%.

  • 0 to 200 m: 100%
  • 200 to 1,000 m: 0%
  • 1,000 to 4,000 m: 0%
  • 4,000 to 6,000 m: 0%
  • below 6,000 m: 0%

Named features near the deepest point: Arabian Basin (1,617 km), Carlsberg Ridge (1,731 km), Ninety East Ridge (1,782 km), Aden Ridge (3,063 km).

The Palk Strait if sea level dropped

The slider on the map lowers the sea in steps. This table shows how much of the Palk Strait's water would be land at each step.

Sea level lowered byBecomes landShare of its water
10 m12,134 km²91.6%
20 m13,221 km²99.8%
50 m13,245 km²100%
80 m13,245 km²100%
120 m13,245 km²100%
200 m13,245 km²100%
500 m13,245 km²100%
1,000 m13,245 km²100%
2,000 m13,245 km²100%
3,000 m13,245 km²100%
4,000 m13,245 km²100%
6,000 m13,245 km²100%

A simple bathtub model: it lowers the sea everywhere by the same amount and does not simulate how water would really drain.

Nearby seas

Nearest by the centre of each outline. All oceans and seas

Frequently asked questions

How deep is the Palk Strait?

On average about 6 m in the GEBCO grid (the middle value is 6 m). The deepest cell inside its outline is 27 m, at 9.34° N, 79.74° E.

How big is the Palk Strait?

About 13,245 km² of water inside its Natural Earth outline, counted from the grid cells that are below sea level.

How much of the Palk Strait would be land if sea level dropped?

With the sea 10 m lower, about 12,134 km² (91.6%) of its water would be land. At 6,000 m lower, 100% would be. This is a simple bathtub model that lowers the sea evenly everywhere.

Data: depths from the GEBCO_2026 grid, statistics worked out inside the Natural Earth outline of the strait. See data sources and licences. The GEBCO Grid should NOT be used for navigation or for any other purpose involving safety at sea.

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