We present a method of determining plate reconstruction uncertainties using empirical probability density functions (PDFs). We convert estimated positioning errors of fracture zone and magnetic anomaly crossings into data PDFs which describe the uncertainty in the location of each fracture zone or magnetic anomaly crossing. An empirical PDF is formed for the rotation between a single plate pair based on the ability to align the rotated data along a series of ridge and transform segments. Monte Carlo techniques are then used to sample the PDFs for rotations between single plate pairs to form a PDF for a sequence of rotations. This is accomplished with a frequency of occurrence approach for a gridded representation of possible combined rotations. We also develop PDFs for the reconstructed positions of points on the rotated plates from the PDF for the rotation. Confidence regions for any of the PDFs are formed by contouring the cumulative probabilities of grid points within the PDF. We provide comparisons with other previously published studies for the anomaly 13 single plate pair reconstruction between the Pacific and Antarctic plates as well as for the anomaly 6 (19.8 Ma) combined reconstruction between the Pacific and North American plates. Results for the anomaly 13 reconstruction are generally consistent with previous studies, but smaller confidence regions are attributed to the more robust nature of the empirical PDF approach that we have used. The 95% confidence region for the anomaly 6 reconstruction is less than half that of the worst case scenario. The benefit of our Monte Carlo technique is that it adequately samples the PDFs for all of the rotations, thus accurately including the effects of coupling uncertainties between pole location and amount of rotation. ¿1991 American Geophysical Union