Eastern Bay of Plenty is located on the northeast side of New Zealand’s North Island. The area is characterised by a largely sandy coastline west of Opape and mainly rocky coastline east of it. It includes Ōhiwa Harbour, a large estuarine system. The harbour is shallow (<11 m) and is characterised by extensive intertidal flats with a large portion of it drying at low tides. Inner and outer shelf habitats in Eastern Bay of Plenty are predominantly sands, interspersed with patchy gravels. Offshore rocky reef habitat is largely confined to the area around Moutohora (Whale Island) and Rurima Island. Shallow rocky reefs occur as a band along the coastline (Haggitt et al. 2008).

The major oceanographic influence on the Eastern Bay of Plenty is the East Auckland Current (Chapell 2013; Stevens et al. 2021). This is a western boundary current formed by the reattachment of an extension of the East Australian Current to the New Zealand continental margin off North Cape. The East Auckland Current flows southward as a series of warm core eddies and then turns east across the Bay of Plenty, before flowing south again at East Cape. For most of the year, it is located beyond the 1,000 m isobath but during austral summer northeast winds push oceanic water onto the shelf. Average sea surface temperatures range from ~14°C in August (winter) up to 21°C in February (summer) (Chappell 2013).

The area overlaps with the North Eastern North Island (offshore) Key Biodiversity Area (KBA 2024).

This Important Shark and Ray Area is benthic and pelagic and is delineated from inshore and surface waters (0 m) to 100 m based on the bathymetry of the area.