The deposit is considered to be an example of an iron oxide–copper–gold (IOCG) deposit.

The Salobo deposit is hosted in the Carajás Mining District within Carajás Province, a sigmoidal-shaped, west–northwest–east–southeast-trending late Archean basin.

The Archean basin contains a basement assemblage that is dominated by granite–tonalitic ortho-gneisses of the Pium Complex, and amphibolite, gneisses and migmatites of the Xingu Complex. The basement rocks are overlain by volcanic and sedimentary rocks of the Itacaiúnas Supergroup, which includes the Igarapé Salobo Group, the Igarapé Pojuca Group, Grão Pará Group and the Igarapé Bahia Group. The Itacaiúnas Supergroup hosts all the Carajás IOCG deposits, including Salobo.

Mineralization at the Salobo deposit is hosted by upper-greenschist-to-loweramphibolite-metamorphosed rocks of the Igarapé Salobo Group. The major host units are biotite and magnetite schists. The Salobo hydrothermal system has a core of massive magnetite that is surrounded by less intensely altered rocks. Away from the massive magnetite, the magnetite content gradually diminishes, giving way to biotite–garnet schist and/or garnet–grunerite schist.

The deposit extends over an area of approximately 4 km along strike (west–northwest), is 100–600 m wide, and has been recognized to depths of 750 m below the surface. The Salobo mineralization is limited in strike extent, but remains open at depth below the current design pit.

Sulphide mineralization typically consists of assemblages of magnetite–chalcopyrite–bornite and magnetite–bornite–chalcocite. Accessory minerals include hematite, molybdenite, ilmenite, uraninite, graphite, digenite, covellite, and sulphosalts.

Mining at the Salobo Operations utilizes standard open pit methods with drilling and blasting, loading and hauling, using 15 m benches in rock and 8 m loading benches in saprolites. Electrical cable shovels with 220 t and 327 t trucks are used for bulk mining, hydraulic shovels, and 220 t trucks are used in the saprolites with soft ground conditions and occasionally at pit bottoms to improve selectivity.

In order to improve the ore recovery at the bottom of the pit even further, the last six benches will be developed with 25 m wide, 12% ramps, and mining will be performed with a Cat 374 backhoe with a 4.5 m bucket and 8 x 4 40 t trucks. Although blasting will continue to be in 15 m benches, the mining will take place in 4 m slices.

Production drilling is done using Atlas Copco Pit Viper 351 and BE 49R drills, both with 12½ inch (31.75 cm) drill bits. The drill pattern varies depending on ore or waste. Smaller drills are used for pre-splitting and pit wall control.

The run-of-mine is processed by means of standard primary and secondary crushing, conveying, roller press grinding, ball milling, copper concentrate flotation, tailings disposal, concentrate thickening, filtration and load out.