What Is the Deepest Point in the Ocean?
The deepest place on Earth is so far down that if you dropped Mount Everest into it, the peak would still be more than a mile underwater.
Quick Answer
The Challenger Deep, located in the Mariana Trench in the western Pacific Ocean, is the deepest known point in the ocean at approximately 10,935 meters (35,876 feet) below sea level.
The Mariana Trench is a crescent-shaped trench in the western Pacific Ocean, stretching about 2,550 kilometers (1,580 miles) long and averaging 69 kilometers (43 miles) wide. Its deepest point, the Challenger Deep, lies about 300 kilometers southwest of Guam.
The trench formed through a geological process called subduction, where the Pacific tectonic plate slides beneath the smaller Mariana Plate. This ongoing process has been creating the trench for millions of years and continues today.
The pressure at the bottom of the Challenger Deep is over 1,000 times atmospheric pressure at sea level — about 1,086 bars. Despite these crushing conditions, life exists there. Scientists have discovered single-celled organisms (foraminifera), small crustaceans (amphipods), and even fish adapted to survive in this extreme environment.
Only a handful of people have ever visited the Challenger Deep. The first descent was made in 1960 by Jacques Piccard and Don Walsh in the bathyscaphe Trieste. In 2012, filmmaker James Cameron made the first solo descent. Since then, explorer Victor Vescovo and a few others have also reached the bottom, but more people have walked on the Moon than have visited the deepest point in our own ocean.
Key Fact
The Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench reaches 10,935 meters (35,876 feet) below sea level — so deep that if Mount Everest were placed at the bottom, its summit would still be over 2,000 meters underwater.
Why It Matters
Studying the deep ocean teaches us about the limits of life on Earth and informs the search for life on other worlds. Organisms that thrive in the extreme pressure and darkness of deep trenches are studied for their unique biochemistry, which has applications in medicine and biotechnology. Deep ocean research also helps scientists understand earthquake and tsunami risks, as subduction zones like the Mariana Trench are among the most seismically active areas on Earth. The discovery of pollution even at these extreme depths highlights the global scale of ocean contamination.
Did You Know?
- •More people have walked on the Moon (12) than have visited the bottom of the Challenger Deep (fewer than 30 as of 2025).
- •Plastic pollution has been found at the bottom of the Mariana Trench — a plastic bag was spotted at 10,898 meters in 2018.
- •Sound takes about 7 seconds to travel from the surface to the bottom of the Challenger Deep.
- •The water temperature at the bottom is just above freezing, between 1–4°C (34–39°F).
- •If the ocean were drained, the Mariana Trench would be the most prominent feature visible from space.
How to Understand Ocean Depth Measurement
Learn how scientists measure the deepest points of the ocean floor.
- 1
Understand sonar technology
Ships use multibeam sonar to send sound waves to the ocean floor and measure the time it takes for echoes to return.
- 2
Know the record depth
The Mariana Trench's Challenger Deep reaches approximately 10,935 meters (35,876 feet) — the deepest known point on Earth.
- 3
Compare for perspective
If Mount Everest were placed in the Mariana Trench, its peak would still be over 2 km underwater.
Key Dates
1875
HMS Challenger expedition first surveyed the Mariana Trench and recorded a depth of 8,184 meters
1960
Jacques Piccard and Don Walsh reached the Challenger Deep in the bathyscaphe Trieste
2012
James Cameron made the first solo descent to the Challenger Deep in the Deepsea Challenger
2019
Victor Vescovo reached the deepest point ever recorded: 10,928 meters
2020
The Chinese submersible Fendouzhe reached 10,909 meters with three people aboard
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