EARTHQUAKEM5.1

M5.1 earthquake near Noda, Japan

Map: the earthquake near Noda, Japan, with plate boundaries

A magnitude 5.1 earthquake struck 72 km (45 mi) east-northeast of Noda, Japan on Friday, October 23, 2026 at 16:07 UTC, at a depth of 38 km (24 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 Sendai, Japan, about 272 km (169 mi) away.

2 people reported feeling it to USGS “Did You Feel It?”.

MagnitudeM5.1
Depth38 km (24 mi)
Time (UTC)Oct 23 16:07
Location40.42°N 142.57°E
Nearest townNoda · 72 km
Energy674 tons TNT
Aftershocks M2.5+1
Tsunami flagNo
Felt reports2
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Why here?

This earthquake struck about 150 km (93 mi) from the boundary between the North American and Pacific 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 5.1 released roughly the energy of 674 tons of TNT. That is about 45 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 4,000,000 times more than this one.

Aftershocks

In the first 3 days after it, USGS recorded 1 smaller earthquake of magnitude 2.5 or more within 100 km (62 mi). It was a magnitude 4.2 on October 26 at 04:12 UTC.

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 402 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 23, 2026 or earthquakes by day.

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