Earthquakes near San Salvador, 1927–2026

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. 18 earthquakes here in these years are on NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes. NOAA records deaths in 15 of the events here, 25,842 in all. The ten years with the most magnitude 6+ earthquakes were 1997–2006, with 6 of the 22. The latest on NOAA’s list is a magnitude 5.7 on July 29, 2025 (6 km SE of Comapa, Guatemala). NOAA lists one tsunami that began within 100 km of San Salvador, and one from elsewhere that reached it with deaths or a metre of water or more. The highest water NOAA records here was 6.3 m, on August 27, 2012. NOAA lists one significant eruption of one volcano within 100 km of San Salvador. The largest was Santa Ana on October 1, 2005, at 3 on the volcanic explosivity index. It killed 2 people by NOAA’s count.

• July 29, 2025Earthquake · M 5.76 km SE of Comapa, Guatemala · one death (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI
• August 27, 2012Tsunami · 6.3 m hereEl Salvador-NicaraguaNOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• October 1, 2005Eruption · VEI 3Santa Ana · 2 deaths (NOAA)NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• January 13, 2001Earthquake · M 7.728 km SSW of Puerto El Triunfo, El Salvador · 844 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• February 4, 1976Earthquake · M 7.57 km N of Los Amates, Guatemala · 23,000 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia

• An event counts for San Salvador 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