EARTHQUAKEM4.4

M4.4 earthquake near Tamarindo, Costa Rica

Map: the earthquake near Tamarindo, Costa Rica, with plate boundaries

A magnitude 4.4 earthquake struck 16 km (10 mi) west of Tamarindo, Costa Rica on Thursday, October 15, 2026 at 15:40 UTC, at a depth of 34 km (21 mi), according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Shallow quakes like this one shake the surface hardest. The nearest city of a million or more people is San Jose, Costa Rica, about 213 km (132 mi) away.

1 person reported feeling it to USGS “Did You Feel It?”.

MagnitudeM4.4
Depth34 km (21 mi)
Time (UTC)Oct 15 15:40
Location10.31°N 86.00°W
Nearest townTamarindo · 16 km
Energy60 tons TNT
Aftershocks M2.5+0
Tsunami flagNo
Felt reports1
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Why here?

This earthquake struck about 65 km (40 mi) from the boundary between the Cocos and Caribbean plates. Most earthquakes happen along plate boundaries like this one, where the pieces of Earth’s outer shell collide, pull apart or grind past each other. Stress builds up over years until the rock suddenly slips.

The red lines on the map are plate boundaries.

How strong was it?

Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step releases about 32 times more energy. This magnitude 4.4 released roughly the energy of 60 tons of TNT. That is about 4 times the energy of a magnitude 4.0, a quake people nearby feel but that rarely causes damage. The strongest earthquake ever recorded, magnitude 9.5 in Chile in 1960, released about 45,000,000 times more than this one.

Aftershocks

In the first 11 days after it, USGS recorded no smaller earthquakes of magnitude 2.5 or more within 100 km (62 mi).

Outside the United States, USGS mainly lists quakes of about magnitude 4 and up, so smaller aftershocks there are undercounted.

Earthquake history here

Before this earthquake, USGS had recorded 117 earthquakes of magnitude 6 or larger within 300 km (186 mi) since 1900. The strongest:

Official details, updates and the shaking map: USGS event page.

See every earthquake on October 15, 2026 or earthquakes by day.

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