Which Volcanoes Are Erupting Right Now?
More than you would guess, and fewer than the word “active” implies. Dozens of volcanoes are in eruption as you read this, almost none of them in the news. Here is how to find out which ones, how to read what you find, and which widely repeated statistic about volcanoes is simply wrong.
“Active” Is Doing a Lot of Work in That Sentence
Almost every misunderstanding about volcano trackers starts here. Active means capable of erupting — it says nothing about today. Continuing eruption, the status GVP uses, means eruptive events without a gap of three months or more, which can describe a volcano that last did something visible in June. Erupting right now is a much smaller set: of the 40 continuing eruptions on the list, GVP’s own guidance is that roughly 20 will be doing something on any particular day.
So a map showing hundreds of markers is not showing you hundreds of eruptions. It is showing you volcanoes. That is why our volcano tracker puts each one’s last known eruption on the card rather than a status label — a date cannot be misread the way a word can.
It now separates the two outright. Switch the activity filter to Erupting now and the 1,214-volcano catalogue collapses to the few dozen with an open eruption record, each ringed on the map and labelled with when it started and its VEI — Kīlauea since December 2024, Stromboli since 1934, Yasur since 1270. One caveat we would rather state than bury: this comes from GVP’s structured eruption service, which trails their own current-eruptions page by a volcano or two. If a headline eruption is missing, that page is the more current one.
Three Questions, Three Different Pages
Volcano monitoring is one of those areas where the honest answer is that no single page does everything. Ours does one of these well and does not attempt the others.
| You want to know | Open |
|---|---|
| Which volcanoes are erupting right now? Filter to “Erupting now” for GVP’s continuing eruptions, each with its start date and VEI, mapped. | LK Forge Volcano Tracker → |
| Where are the world’s volcanoes, and when did each last erupt? The full 1,214-volcano Holocene catalogue — search near you, filter by activity and type. | LK Forge Volcano Tracker → |
| What is the alert level, and is there a webcam? US alert levels, aviation colour codes, webcams and an email notification service. We publish none of these. | USGS Volcano Hazards → agency site |
Our tracker and GVP’s list are not competing — ours is built on their data. What we add is the map, the near-me search and the filters; what they add is the authority and the eruption status. Both are free and neither wants an account.
Where the Volcanoes Actually Are
The Ring of Fire is the arc tracing the Pacific margin, and it earns its reputation — but not in the way the usual statistic claims. By GVP’s count it holds 687 of the world’s 1,214 Holocene volcanoes. That is 57%: a clear majority, and nothing like the three-quarters figure that circulates.
The number that does justify the reputation is eruption frequency. Since 1960 there have been 1,543 confirmed eruptions in Ring of Fire regions — 68% of the global total. The arc is not where most volcanoes are by a landslide; it is where they go off most often. Subduction does that.
Practically, this is why every live map looks the same: a dense curve down the Pacific with outliers in Iceland, East Africa and the Mediterranean. Once you recognise the shape, orienting yourself on any tracker takes a second. Filter our map by region and the pattern separates cleanly.
Mistakes Worth Skipping
Reading “active” as “erupting right now”
This is the big one. An active volcano is one capable of erupting, not one currently doing so — most are in a repose period that can run for decades. Our tracker shows the last known eruption for exactly this reason: a date is harder to misread than a status word.
Assuming a single tracker sees everything
It does not. Remote eruptions go unreported for days, and most submarine activity is never directly observed at all. Anything presented as a complete picture of global volcanism is overstating what the observing network can actually see.
Treating the VEI scale as linear
The Volcanic Explosivity Index runs 0 to 8 and each step is roughly a tenfold increase in erupted volume. Most monitored eruptions sit at 1 to 3. The gap between a VEI 3 and a VEI 5 is not two steps of anything you can picture.
Ignoring quiet volcanoes near cities
Hazard is exposure as much as activity. Campi Flegrei sits under the western suburbs of Naples and has shown ground uplift for decades without a modern eruption. A tracker showing only what is erupting today will never surface that.
Using any of this for a travel decision
Aggregated data is for understanding, not safety. Before travelling anywhere near an active volcano, the national observatory and the civil protection authority are the only sources that count — and they are the ones with a legal duty to be right.
Common Questions
How many volcanoes are erupting right now?
When we checked the Smithsonian Global Volcanism Program’s current-eruptions list on 16 August 2026, it carried 40 volcanoes in continuing eruption. GVP’s own framing is that there are typically 40 to 50 continuing eruptions at any time, of which roughly 20 are actively erupting on a given day. "Continuing" is a technical status: it means eruptive events without a break of three months or more, not necessarily activity today. The list changes, so check it rather than quoting a number from an article — including this one.
Is 75% of the world’s volcanoes really in the Ring of Fire?
No, and this is one of the most repeated errors in volcano writing. Going to GVP’s own Pacific Ring of Fire page, the region contains 687 Holocene volcanoes out of 1,214 worldwide — that is 57%, not 75%. Where the Ring of Fire genuinely does dominate is eruption frequency: 1,543 confirmed eruptions there since 1960, which is 68% of the global total. So the arc punches well above its share, but the commonly quoted headline figure overstates it by a wide margin.
What does the LK Forge volcano tracker actually show?
An interactive map and searchable list of the world’s volcanoes, built on Smithsonian GVP data, showing each volcano’s location, type and last known eruption. It also carries an "Erupting now" filter drawn from GVP’s continuing-eruption records, which marks those volcanoes on the map and shows each one’s eruption start date and VEI. You can search near your own location, filter by activity, type and region, and click through to the full GVP profile for any volcano. What it does not show is live alert levels, aviation colour codes or webcam feeds — for those, the USGS Volcano Hazards Program and the relevant national observatory are the right destinations, and we would rather say so than imply coverage we do not have.
What is the Volcanic Explosivity Index?
A 0-to-8 scale rating eruption size by erupted volume and plume height. It is logarithmic, so each step up is roughly ten times more material. Most monitored eruptions land between 1 and 3. The 1980 Mount St Helens eruption was a 5. Events at 5 and above can have regional or global climate effects, and no VEI 8 has occurred in recorded history. If you see a 4 or above attached to a live event, that is the point at which it is genuinely unusual.
Can I watch an eruption live on camera?
For a handful of well-instrumented volcanoes, yes. Kīlauea, Etna and Stromboli all have public camera feeds, generally run by the monitoring institution rather than by any tracker — the USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory for Kīlauea, and Italy’s INGV for Etna and Stromboli. Stromboli is the most reliably watchable, because it produces small bursts every ten to twenty minutes and they show up best after dark. We do not host or mirror any of these feeds.
Every volcano on Earth, mapped from Smithsonian GVP data with its last known eruption — plus an Erupting now filter showing which ones have an open eruption, when it started and its VEI. Free, no sign-up.
Open the volcano tracker →Volcanoes rarely travel alone: we also run live earthquake and wildfire trackers, and a live planetary snapshot.