Venus may be overwhelmingly inhospitable today, but many planetary scientists believe that it wasn’t always this way. Billions of years ago, some observational evidence suggested that our planetary neighbor may have looked far more like Earth, complete with oceans potentially capable of harboring life.
Through new research published in Earth and Planetary Science Letters, a team led by Richard Ghail at the University of London has taken a fresh look at Venus’s surface. Through new analysis of its distinctive features, their findings strengthen the case for a watery past, hinting at the possibility of oceans far larger than previously thought.
Cracked surfaces
Today, much of Venus’s surface is covered in mysterious networks of cracks whose origins have long been debated. One especially puzzling type appears across the planet’s low-lying plains, where the ground is fractured into numerous polygon shapes, each stretching roughly 1 to 2 kilometers (0.6 to 1.2 miles) across. For decades, the leading explanation was that these patterns formed as volcanic rock cooled and contracted.
Ghail’s team classified these polygon fields into six distinct types, based on differences in how the cracks are shaped and arranged. Rather than volcanic cooling, they argue the patterns look strikingly similar to cracks that form in seafloor mud on Earth, when thick layers of waterlogged clay get buried, compacted and squeezed dry over time—cracking into polygon shapes as they shrink.
Echoes of Earth’s past
Striking parallels to this effect aren’t unprecedented on Earth. Around 6 million years ago, the Mediterranean Sea almost entirely dried up in an event now known as the Messinian salinity crisis, leaving behind thick salt deposits and distinctive cracked terrain as it evaporated. Using this event as a guide, the researchers identified other Venusian features that may have formed through a similar process.
Among the features they considered are long, winding channels called “canali”—usually assumed to be carved by flowing lava. In contrast, Ghail’s team points out their similarity to submarine channels carved by water on ancient seafloors. Meanwhile, wrinkled ridges that interweave across Venus’s lowlands could be sitting atop thick layers of salt, left behind as Venus’s oceans evaporated away.
Hypothesis, not proof
The team is careful to note that these features aren’t proof on their own. For now, volcanic explanations for the cracks, channels and wrinkles can’t be ruled out, and far more detailed observations of the Venusian surface will be needed to confirm their marine hypothesis. All the same, their findings add meaningful weight to the idea that Venus once had stable, long-lived oceans, and possibly even the conditions needed for life.
Beyond Venus itself, a deeper understanding of how a planet can lose its oceans could help planetary scientists better judge which distant exoplanets might be capable of holding onto water. It may even offer a glimpse of what could eventually happen to Earth’s own oceans in the late stages of the sun’s life cycle, billions of years from now.
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Publication details
Richard C. Ghail et al, The lost oceans of Venus, Earth and Planetary Science Letters (2026). DOI: 10.1016/j.epsl.2026.120255
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Venus’s polygonal plains could point to a watery past (2026, August 5)
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