The story
The last reliable Megalodon teeth date to the early Pliocene. An influential 2014 study by Catalina Pimiento and Christopher Clements put extinction at about 2.6 million years ago, while a 2019 review by Robert Boessenecker and colleagues dated the last teeth to about 3.6 million years ago, which is now more widely cited. Either way, Megalodon had disappeared long before humans and was not a survivor in the deep sea, despite popular rumours.
Pliocene seas were cooling and sea level was falling as polar ice grew. The warm coastal nurseries that Megalodon used shrank, and the whale community changed. Competition from the smaller great white shark, which could handle cooler water, is also suggested, since the two sharks overlap in the fossil record. Megalodon was probably warm-bodied, and its large body size needed lots of food, making it vulnerable to a shortage of prey. The great white and killer whales then became the top ocean predators.
Why it mattered
- The extinction shows how long term climate shifts can remove even the largest predators.
- It shows that the sea's top predator role is open to replacement, as great whites and killer whales rose.
- Pliocene marine extinctions are a guide to how oceans respond to cooling and sea level change.
Contested history
Consensus: Megalodon died out in the Pliocene, several million years ago, probably because of climate and prey changes.
- Megalodon extinct great white shark National Geographic
Community notes
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