Find out in numbers which is the largest ocean in the world and learn a few more facts about these saltwater giants
The seas and oceans occupy most of the Earth: about 70% of the planet’s surface is covered by them. Home to a huge number of life forms, many of which humanity has not yet identified, the oceans play an important role in regulating the world’s climate. How much do you know about them? Do you know which is the biggest and deepest ocean?
- More than 80% of the ocean is still unknown. Understand why!
- How were the names of the oceans divided and defined?
Using a map of the world, it’s not that difficult to see which is the largest of the oceans, although certain cartographic projections slightly distort the dimensions when transposing the globe to canvas or paper. But the canaltech it tells you the size of each ocean in numbers, plus their average depths and a few other tidbits of these huge bodies of water.
What are the five oceans
The five oceans of the Earth are, in increasing order of magnitude:
- Arctic Ocean: Located northernmost on the planet, the Arctic bathes the north of Canada, Russia, Norway, Iceland and the US state of Alaska, as well as all of Greenland. It covers an area of 14 million square kilometers and has an average depth of 1,038 metres.
- Southern Ocean: On the other side of the planet is the Southern Ocean with approximately 20.3 million square kilometers. Your limits were discussed at length in the international community, but today it is considered the entire area below 60ºS latitude. It bathes the whole of Antarctica and its average depth varies between 4 and 5 thousand metres.
- Indian Ocean: Located between Africa, Asia and Oceania, the Indian Ocean is approximately 70.5 million square kilometers in size and has an average depth of 3.7 kilometers.
- Atlantic Ocean: Separating Europe and Africa from the Americas, the Atlantic has an area of 106 million square kilometers. This is equivalent to one fifth of the entire surface of the world. Formed by the separation of tectonic plates, the South Atlantic continues to rise distance between America and Africa at a rate of about 3 cm/year. Its average depth is 3.6 kilometers.
- Pacific Ocean: The largest ocean of all, at approximately 165 million square kilometers, the Pacific borders the Americas, Asia, and Oceania. This area represents 46% of the planet’s water cover and a third of the surface of the entire Earth.
Pacific: the largest of the oceans
The Pacific is more than 10 times the size of the smallest ocean, the Arctic. Its area is also close to that of the second and third largest oceans, the Atlantic and Indian combined. This huge extension makes the territory sheltered several islands: Approximately 25,000 are contained in the Pacific. Among the most famous are Hawaii, the islands Galapagos and Easter.
Its name derives from the circumnavigation carried out under the command of the Portuguese Fernão de Magalhães, in 1521. The navigator coined the title after having found waters calmer than those of the Atlantic during his journey, although this calm is not true for all regions of this vast ocean.
What is the difference between sea and ocean?
OR canaltech already explained what is the difference between seas and oceans and you can recall the concepts in detail in the original article. In short, we can say that the oceans are bigger and deeper than the seas. They are also surrounded by continents, while the delimitation of the seas is made by countries. Typically, the salinity of the seas is greater than that of the oceans.
What is the deepest ocean?
Besides being the largest, so is the Pacific Ocean it is the deepest🇧🇷 Its average depth is estimated to be 4,288 meters. Additionally, the Pacific is home to the deepest known point on the entire planet, the Mariana Rift, which is 11 kilometers deep.
The Mariana Trench is much larger than the planet’s above-sea peak, Mount Everest, which borders on 9 kilometers in altitude. Even the typical height of a commercial flight does not reach such a distance from the surface, being limited to about 10.6 kilometers in altitude.
Which ocean borders Brazil?
Brazil is entirely surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean. From Rio Grande do Sul to Amapá, 17 of Brazil’s 26 states are in contact with this ocean, while the other nine and the Federal District are not on the coast. The Brazilian coast is 7,491 kilometers long.
In addition, Brazil has several islands, including five oceanic islands and archipelagos: the archipelagos of Fernando de Noronha, and São Pedro and São Paulo, Atol das Rocas, the islands of Trindade and Martin Vaz. These islands differ from the others in that they are further from the mainland, having a different geological origin from the coastal islands.
In addition to the importance of these places from a natural point of view, the oceanic islands have a great political and economic importance, as they guarantee a greater radius of sovereignty to the country, extending the area in which Brazil can exploit the natural resources of the Ocean.
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Camila Luna is a writer at Gossipify, where she covers the latest movies and television series. With a passion for all things entertainment, Camila brings her unique perspective to her writing and offers readers an inside look at the industry. Camila is a graduate from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with a degree in English and is also a avid movie watcher.
