1] At the subduction zone in northwestern Costa Rica, the seismogenic zone lies directly beneath the Nicoya Peninsula, allowing for near source seismic studies of earthquake activity. We located 650 earthquakes along the seismogenic plate interface using a dense seismic network in the vicinity of the Nicoya Peninsula. Using these data we constrained the updip limit of the seismogenic zone there and found a transition in depth, 10 km in the south to 20 km in the north, that occurs where the subducting oceanic crust changes from warmer Cocos-Nazca Spreading center (CNS) origin to colder East Pacific Rise (EPR) origin. We argue that the temperature of the incoming oceanic crust controls the seismogenic updip limit beneath Nicoya, Costa Rica; subducting colder oceanic crust deepens the seismogenic updip limit. INDEX TERMS: 3015 Marine Geology and Geophysics: Heat flow (benthic) and hydrothermal processes; 7209 Seismology: Earthquake dynamics and mechanics; 7220 Seismology: Oceanic crust; 7230 Seismology: Seismicity and seismotectonics.