What is a deep well plate?
A microplate whose wells are built for volume instead of optics: milliliters per well, on the same standard footprint and grid as the assay plates the samples will end up in.
A deep well plate is a microplate with tall wells. Where a standard 96 well plate holds a few hundred microliters per well for assays read in place, a deep well plate holds 0.5 to 2.2 mL per well for storage, mixing, extraction, and growth, while keeping the ANSI/SLAS footprint and the 9 mm well grid that instruments and pipettes are built around.
The standard underneath
The footprint is 127.76 by 85.48 mm and the wells sit on the same 9 mm pitch as any 96 well plate, so a deep well plate loads into the same readers, handlers, shakers, and stackers, subject to one check: height. Depth is bought with height, about 44 mm for the tall classes against about 14 mm for a standard assay plate, and height is the specification that decides which instruments accept the plate.
The 96 deep well plate in numbers
- Wells: 96, in 8 rows (A to H) by 12 columns
- Well spacing: 9 mm center to center
- Footprint: 127.76 by 85.48 mm, the ANSI/SLAS standard
- Volumes: 0.5 to 2.2 mL per well by class, polypropylene
- Heights: about 44 mm tall class, about 28 to 32 mm low profile class
Why depth is its own format
Assay plates are shallow because optics want a short path and meniscus control. Storage and processing want the opposite: volume for dilutions, washes, beads, and headspace. The deep well plate is the format that holds working quantities in the same addresses the assay will use, so a sample's identity, its well address, survives from archive to readout without a reformat step where samples get lost.
Who uses 96 deep well plates
- Compound management: DMSO libraries stored frozen, thawed, and sampled for screening.
- Screening labs: mother plates and working aliquots feeding assay plates.
- Analytical and sample prep labs: extractions, digestions, and bead cleanups at milliliter scale.
- Microbiology groups: hundreds of parallel small cultures on shakers.
Related guides
Common questions
Is a deep well plate a microplate?
Yes. It is a microplate in the standard footprint family whose wells are deeper than an assay plate's. Same outline, same grid, taller wells, and a height specification that replaces the assay plate's optical specifications as the fit question.
What is the difference between a deep well plate and a regular 96 well plate?
Depth and purpose. A regular 96 well plate holds a few hundred microliters for reactions and reads in place. A deep well plate holds 0.5 to 2.2 mL per well for storage and processing, in polypropylene rather than polystyrene, sealed with mats and films rather than lids.
Why are deep well plates polypropylene?
Because of what they hold and where they live: solvents including DMSO, freezer temperatures to -80 C, and samples that must not bind to the walls. Polypropylene resists solvents, tolerates freezing, and binds less sample than polystyrene. Optical clarity, the reason assay plates are polystyrene, does not matter for storage.
What does 8 by 12 mean on a 96 well plate?
The well layout: 8 rows lettered A to H and 12 columns numbered 1 to 12. Wells are named by row and column, so H12 is the corner well in row H, column 12. Plate maps, handlers, and library records all use the same addresses.
Are all 96 deep well plates the same?
No. They share a footprint and grid, but differ in volume class, well shape and bottom, height, and skirt design. Fit and function follow those details: a handler that accepts one 44 mm plate may reject another with a different skirt, and a KingFisher run needs the plate family the instrument was built around.