Download GPlates and Data

Download GPlates

The current stable release of GPlates is GPlates 2.5, released in April 2024...

Download GPlates Download GPlates 2.5

(the latest “stable” release)

The current beta release of pyGPlates is pyGPlates 0.36, released in May 2022...

Download pyGPlates Download pyGPlates 0.36

(the latest “beta” release)

The current stable release of GPlately:

Download GPlately Download GPlately 1.3.0

(the latest “stable” release)

GPlates binary packages

Ready-to-use binary packages are available to install GPlates on Windows, macOS and Ubuntu. These also include the GPlates-compatible geodata described below.

  • For Windows, we provide an .exe installer for a 64-bit version of GPlates on a 64-bit version of Windows. We also provide a .zip file for users who wish to use GPlates without installing it.
  • For macOS on Intel (x86_64), we provide a .dmg disk image containing a 64-bit version of GPlates for Catalina (10.15) or above.
  • For macOS on Apple Silicon (arm64), we provide a .dmg disk image containing a 64-bit version of GPlates for Big Sur (11) or above.
  • For Ubuntu, we provide .deb packages for 64-bit Ubuntu versions (that are currently under support).
    • If you are using a different Linux distribution please use the source code package instead.

Installation instructions for GPlates can be found on the download page.

You can also download older versions of GPlates:

PyGPlates binary packages

Ready-to-use binary packages are available to install pyGPlates on Windows, macOS and Ubuntu. These do not include the GPlates-compatible geodata.

  • For Windows, we provide a .zip file for each Python version (3.7, 3.8, 3.9 and 3.10).
    • Containing 64-bit pyGPlates for use on a 64-bit version of Windows.
  • For macOS on Intel (x86_64), we provide a .zip file for each Python version (3.7, 3.8, 3.9 and 3.10).
    • Containing 64-bit pyGPlates for use on an Intel Mac running macOS Catalina (10.15) or above.
  • For macOS on Apple Silicon (arm64), we provide a .zip file for each Python version (3.7, 3.8, 3.9 and 3.10).
    • Containing 64-bit pyGPlates for use on an Apple Silicon Mac running macOS Big Sur (11) or above.
  • For Ubuntu on Intel (amd64) and ARM (arm64), we provide a .deb package for each 64-bit Ubuntu version.
    • Packages are provided for Ubuntu versions under standard support.
    • The Ubuntu version determines the Python version (eg, Ubuntu Jammy 22.04 uses Python 3.10).
    • If you are using a different Linux distribution please use the source code package instead.

Installation instructions for pyGPlates can be found in the pyGPlates documentation.

You can also download older versions of pyGPlates:

GPlates and pyGPlates source code

We provide source-code packages for Windows (in a zip-file), and Linux and macOS (in a tarball). The source-code packages do not contain geodata (described below) which will need to be downloaded separately.

To compile GPlates (or pyGPlates) from source, you will require:

  • Boost 1.35 or above
  • CGAL 4.7 or above (preferably 4.12 or above)
  • CMake 3.10 or above
  • GDAL 1.3.2 or above (preferably 2 or above)
  • GLEW
  • PROJ 4.6 or above (preferably 6 or above)
  • Python 3.7 or above (or 2.7)
  • Qt 5.6 - 5.15 (note: 6.x will only be supported for GPlates 3.0)
  • Qwt 6.0.1 or above (preferably 6.1 or above)

Instructions on how to compile GPlates (or pyGPlates) from source may be found in the source-code releases, in the files:

  • DEPS.Linux and BUILD.Linux (on Linux)
  • DEPS.OSX and BUILD.OSX (on macOS)
  • DEPS.Windows and BUILD.Windows (on Windows)

Please note that you should not attempt to compile GPlates from the pyGPlates source code. Or attempt to compile pyGPlates from the GPlates source code.

GPlates (and pyGPlates) is free software (also known as open-source software), licensed for distribution under the GNU General Public License (GPL) version 2.

GPlately installation

1. Using conda (recommended)

You can install the latest stable public release of GPlately and all of its dependencies using conda. This is the preferred method to install GPlately which downloads binaries from the conda-forge channel.

conda install -c conda-forge gplately

Creating a new conda environment

We recommend creating a new conda environment inside which to install GPlately. This avoids any potential conflicts in your base Python environment. In the example below we create a new environment called "my-env":

conda create -n my-env
conda activate my-env
conda install -c conda-forge gplately

my-env needs to be activated whenever you use GPlately: i.e. conda activate my-env.

2. Using pip

Alternatively, you can install the latest stable public release of GPlately using the pip package manager.

pip install gplately

or from this GitHub repository:

pip install git+https://github.com/GPlates/gplately.git

Pull from repository

First-time installation: To install the latest version of GPlately from a specific repository branch (e.g. master), copy the following commands into your terminal:

cd /path/to/desired/directory #Change your command directory to where you'd like to clone GPlately
git clone https://github.com/GPlates/gplately.git
cd gplately # navigate within the gplately folder
git checkout master # or the name of whichever branch you need
git pull # fetch all recent changes from this branch
pip install .

Update installation from cloned repo: To update your installation of GPlately by fetching the latest pushes from a specific repository branch (e.g. master), copy the following commands into your terminal:

cd /path/to/gplately/directory #Should be where gplately is cloned - must end in /.../gplately
git checkout master # or the name of whichever branch you need
git pull # fetch all recent changes from this branch
pip install .

Download GPlates-compatible Data

Researchers in the EarthByte Project have made GPlates-compatible data available for use with GPlates.

A sample set of these data-files are also contained within the GPlates installation packages, and will be automatically installed with GPlates. This data has been updated for the GPlates 2.5 release. Thanks to the EarthByte Project for making these data-files available!

Go to EarthByte website for more data and models.

GPlates Logo

You may download GPlates logo in SVG format. Click here to download GPlates logo files.

PyGPlates Logo

You may download PyGPlates logo in .ai and .png format. Click here to download PyGPlates logo files.

GPlates Download Statistics

Click here to see the GPlates download statistics.