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Bara La Afrika

Harim · Mountains of Africa

Africa’s mountains and their heights, country by country.

At a glance

All Africa

Map of the peaks

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Height

  • Above 5,000 m0
  • 4,000–5,000 m0
  • 3,000–4,000 m0
  • 3,000 m or lower0
  • Peaks close together

All 0 peaks are shown.

Tab into the map, then use the arrow keys to move from peak to peak (tallest first) and Enter to open one. Grouped peaks open a list. Pinch or use the buttons to zoom. On a computer, hold Ctrl (or ⌘) and scroll.

The same mountains as a table

Why are Africa’s highest mountains where they are?

Africa’s tallest mountains are not one great range: they come from a handful of very different geological stories.

  • The East African Rift

    Africa is slowly splitting along the rift, a developing divergent plate boundary between the Nubian and Somali plates. Rising magma built its great volcanoes: Kilimanjaro, Mount Kenya, Mount Meru, Mount Elgon and the Virunga volcanoes such as Karisimbi and Nyiragongo. The Rwenzori are different: not volcanic at all, but a block of ancient crystalline rock pushed up about three million years ago.

  • Lava plateaus lifted high

    The Ethiopian Highlands, home of Ras Dashen, are a broad dome raised by magma from the mantle and capped by flood basalts that began to pile up about 30 million years ago. The high Drakensberg along Lesotho’s borders is a thick layer of basalt that erupted about 180 million years ago; southern Africa has been uplifted over the past 20 million years and erosion has carved the escarpment back.

  • A collision in the north

    The High Atlas rose mainly in the last 66 million years as Africa and Europe converged, the same convergence that raised the Alps and the Pyrenees. The Anti-Atlas to its south is far older, from a continental collision about 300 million years ago.

  • Lone volcanoes

    The Cameroon line is a 1,600 km chain of volcanoes running from islands in the Gulf of Guinea to Mount Cameroon and beyond. In the Sahara, the Tibesti’s highest peaks, such as Emi Koussi, are volcanoes built over a hotspot.

  • Old, stable interiors

    Much of the continent rests on cratons, ancient cores of the crust whose roots have stayed stable for billions of years. With little to push them up, they form plateaus and plains rather than high ranges.

Adapted from the Harim prototype’s notes, corrected (the High Atlas is young, not a remnant of ancient events) and checked against these articles: East African Rift, Rwenzori Mountains, Ethiopian Highlands, Drakensberg, Atlas Mountains, Cameroon line, Tibesti Mountains, Craton.