This chart ranks the most abundant elements dissolved in seawater by concentration in grams per litre, excluding the oxygen and hydrogen of the water itself. Chlorine and sodium, the components of common salt, dominate ocean chemistry.

About: Most Abundant Dissolved Elements in Seawater

Overview of the data behind this chart

AI Insight

Chlorine (19.4 g/L) and sodium (10.8 g/L) overwhelmingly dominate the dissolved content of seawater, together forming the sodium chloride that makes the oceans salty. These two elements account for the large majority of sea salt by mass. Magnesium (1.28 g/L) is a distant third, followed by sulfur, calcium and potassium, each below half a gram per litre. After potassium the concentrations plunge: bromine, carbon, strontium and boron appear only in trace amounts measured in thousandths of a gram or less. The steep drop-off, from chlorine at 19.4 down to boron at 0.0045 g/L, a factor of more than 4,000, shows that ocean salinity is essentially a two-element story, with every other element contributing only minor chemical flavouring.

Data source: Abundances of the elements (data page)

Key Findings

Auto-computed highlights from this dataset

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Chlorine leads with 19 in All Time.

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Average value in All Time: 3 · median: 0.

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Gap in All Time: Chlorine is 4311.1× larger than Boron.

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Most Abundant Dissolved Elements in Seawater

Data Insights Below

Data Insights

Numbers, trends & sources behind this chart

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Data Points

10 categories · 1 year

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Top Value

19.40

Chlorine

Concentration in Seawater (g/L) · All Time

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Metrics

Concentration in Seawater (g/L)

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Period

All Time

Single year snapshot

Category Rankings

Concentration in Seawater (g/L) · All Time

#	Category	All Time
🥇	Chlorine	19.40
🥈	Sodium	10.80
🥉	Magnesium	1.28
4	Sulfur	0.90
5	Calcium	0.41
6	Potassium	0.39
7	Bromine	0.07
8	Carbon	0.03
9	Strontium	0.01
10	Boron	0.00

Statistical Summary — Concentration in Seawater (g/L) · All Time

19.40

Maximum

0.00

Minimum

Average

Median

What This Data Shows

Auto-generated trend summaries per category

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Chlorine

Recorded 19.40 Concentration in Seawater (g/L) in All Time.

Source

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Sodium

Recorded 10.80 Concentration in Seawater (g/L) in All Time.

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Magnesium

Recorded 1.28 Concentration in Seawater (g/L) in All Time.

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Sulfur

Recorded 0.90 Concentration in Seawater (g/L) in All Time.

Source

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Calcium

Recorded 0.41 Concentration in Seawater (g/L) in All Time.

Source

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Potassium

Recorded 0.39 Concentration in Seawater (g/L) in All Time.

Source

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Bromine

Recorded 0.07 Concentration in Seawater (g/L) in All Time.

Source

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Carbon

Recorded 0.03 Concentration in Seawater (g/L) in All Time.

Source

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Strontium

Recorded 0.01 Concentration in Seawater (g/L) in All Time.

Source

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Boron

Recorded 0.00 Concentration in Seawater (g/L) in All Time.

Source

Full Data Table

10 records across 1 year

10 sourced

Category	Metric	All Time
Chlorine	Concentration in Seawater (g/L)	19.40
Sodium	Concentration in Seawater (g/L)	10.80
Magnesium	Concentration in Seawater (g/L)	1.28
Sulfur	Concentration in Seawater (g/L)	0.90
Calcium	Concentration in Seawater (g/L)	0.41
Potassium	Concentration in Seawater (g/L)	0.39
Bromine	Concentration in Seawater (g/L)	0.07
Carbon	Concentration in Seawater (g/L)	0.03
Strontium	Concentration in Seawater (g/L)	0.01
Boron	Concentration in Seawater (g/L)	0.00