Japan vs United States: Number of significant volcanic eruptions

Japan

2 events

in 2018

United States

3 events

in 2018

Japan rank

3rd

United States rank

2nd

Number of significant volcanic eruptions over time

Japan
United States

How they compare

United States currently reports 3 events against 2 events in Japan, a difference of 1 events.

That makes United States's figure about 1.5 times Japan's.

The two have swapped places 2 times across 10 shared years of data; in 1856 it was United States ahead.

Japan ranks 3rd and United States ranks 2nd of 25 countries.

Individual pages

About this data

Indicator: Number of significant volcanic eruptions
Unit: events
Source: National Geophysical Data Center / World Data Service (2025) – with major processing by Our World in Data
Licence: CC BY 4.0 (Our World in Data)
Coverage: 25 places, 619 data points, 1050–2024
Last refreshed: 07 August 2026

A significant eruption is classified as one that meets at least one of the following criteria: caused fatalities, caused moderate damage (approximately $1 million or more), with a Volcanic Explosivity Index (VEI) of 6 or larger, caused a tsunami, or was associated with a major earthquake.