Earthquakes near Guatemala City through history

The deadliest was not the strongest: a magnitude 7.5 on February 4, 1976 (7 km N of Los Amates, Guatemala), for which NOAA records 23,000 deaths. NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes has 39 here, back to 1541. NOAA records deaths in 26 of the events here, 30,569 in all. The latest on NOAA’s list is a magnitude 5.7 on July 29, 2025 (6 km SE of Comapa, Guatemala). NOAA’s record here begins on September 11, 1541 with an eruption (Agua). 23 of the 39 significant earthquakes NOAA lists here came before 1927. NOAA lists one tsunami that began within 100 km of Guatemala City. It reached 4 m, on October 6, 2005. NOAA lists 17 significant eruptions of 3 volcanoes within 100 km of Guatemala City. The largest was Fuego on December 26, 1581, at 4 on the volcanic explosivity index. The deadliest was Agua on September 11, 1541, which killed 1,300 people by NOAA’s count.

• July 29, 2025Earthquake · M 5.76 km SE of Comapa, Guatemala · one death (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI
• October 6, 2005Tsunami · 4 m highLago De AtitlanNOAA NCEI
• February 4, 1976Earthquake · M 7.57 km N of Los Amates, Guatemala · 23,000 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• September 7, 1915Earthquake · M 7.712 km NW of Chalatenango, El Salvador · 7 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI
• May 30, 1776Earthquake · M 7.9 (est.)NOAA NCEI
• December 26, 1581Eruption · VEI 4FuegoNOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• September 11, 1541EruptionAgua · 1,300 deaths (NOAA)NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia

• An event counts for Guatemala City when it began within 100 km of its centre, or 200 km for an earthquake of magnitude 7 or more. Damage can reach further.
• USGS counts here start at magnitude 6: the catalogue’s smaller quakes thin out going back, where few instruments listened.
• NOAA lists significant events only: earthquakes that killed, did about $1 million of damage, reached magnitude 7.5 or intensity X, or raised a tsunami, and eruptions and tsunamis by like measures. Magnitudes before 1900 are its estimates from written accounts.
• Deaths are NOAA’s total for each event, wherever people died, its tsunami and fires included. A tsunami counts the dead its runup records give for this place: NOAA’s total for a tsunami includes its source quake’s.
• A tsunami from elsewhere counts where one of its runups killed or rose a metre or more.
• Counted to October 19, 2026, as is the map. The last 30 days ask USGS again.

How the layers work, where their data comes from and what they can’t tell you: Earthquakes, live, The world through history