Iranian Plateau

The Iranian plateau, is a geological formation in Western Asia. It is the part of the Eurasian Plate wedged between the Arabian and Indian plates, situated between the Zagros mountains to the west, the Caspian Sea and the Kopet Dag to the north, the Hormuz Strait and Persian gulf to the south and the Indus River to the east in Pakistan.

As a historical region, it includes Parthia, Media and eastern Persia, the heartlands of Iran and its recently lost territories. The Zagros mountains form the plateau's western boundary, and its eastern slopes may be included in the term. The Encyclopædia Britannica excludes "lowland Khuzestan" explicitly and characterizes Elam as spanning "the region from the Mesopotamian plain to the Iranian Plateau".

From the Caspian in the northwest to Baluchistan in the south-east, the Iranian Plateau extends for close to 2,000 km. It encompasses the greater part of Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan on an area roughly outlined by the quadrangle formed by the cities of Tabriz, Shiraz, Peshawar and Quetta containing some 3,700,000 square kilometres (1,400,000 sq mi). In spite of being called a "plateau", it is far from flat but contains several mountain ranges, the highest peak being Damavand in the Alborz at 5610 m, and the Lut basin east of Kerman in Central Iran falling below 300 m.