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The Patagonian Shelf — sometimes referred to as Argentine Shelf — is part of the continental shelf belonging to the Argentine Sea on the Atlantic Ocean seaboard, south of about 35°S. It adjoins the coasts of Argentina and Uruguay, with the Falkland Islands on a raise to the east, before descending down to the Falklands Plateau.
Various authorities quote different dimensions of the shelf, depending on how they define its limits. Quoted statistics cites its area as being from 1.2 to 2.7 million square kilometres and its maximum width as being between .
The shelf itself can be divided into a band where the seabed slopes at about then a wide plain ( wide) where the seabed slopes gently to isobath. Apart from the Falklands Plateau (which lies to the east of the Falkland Islands), the seabed then falls by up to to and more.
The Falklands Trough separates the Patagonian Shelf from the Scotia Arc of isles that runs from Tierra del Fuego to South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands along the northerly edge of the Scotia Sea in the Southern Ocean.
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