AbstractThis is the second in a pair of articles concerned with the adaptive finite element solution of Riessner‐Mindlin thick plates modeled using first‐order shear deformation theory. This article is concerned with enhancing the a posteriori energy‐error estimators developed in Part I in order to accomodate transition elements in the finite element mesh. The resulting estimators are then used in an adaptive finite element model employing transition elements and the subsequent results discussed and compared with those in Part I. A major part of the article is devoted to identifying a novel patch assembly node algorithm for using the ZZ recovery‐type estimator with transition elements. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Numer Methods Partial Differential Eq 19: 227–253, 2003.