[4] The Precambrian basement of the Santos Basin is exposed as the Araçuaí Belt along the Brazilian coast, most notably in the inselbergs of Rio de Janeiro, of which Sugarloaf Mountain is the most iconic.

The ancient rocks consist of a Neoproterozoic to Cambrian high-grade metamorphic core of granites and gneisses, formed during the collision of Gondwana in the Pan-African-Brasiliano orogeny.

[7] During the Early Cretaceous, the former continent Gondwana, as southern part of Pangea, starting to break-up, resulting in a sequence of rift basins bordering the present-day South Atlantic.

[citation needed] Five tectonic stages have been identified in the Brazilian basins:[8] Oil reservoirs include formations deposited during the Aptian and pre-Aptian continental rift phase, of post-salt Albian-Cenomanian shallow-water marine carbonates and deepwater sandstones, and in turbidites of the open marine drift phase of Late Cretaceous and early Tertiary ages.

The largest Marlim field is located in the northeast of the basin, 110 kilometres (68 mi) offshore in water depths ranging from 650 to 1,050 metres (2,130 to 3,440 ft).

[9] By 2003, 41 oil and gas fields were discovered, which ranging at distances from 50 to 140 kilometres (31 to 87 mi) from the coast and at water depths varying from 80 to 2,400 metres (260 to 7,870 ft).