Seas, Rivers and Straits: The Physical Map Explained

Political geography gets the attention, but the physical map is where a lot of geography actually happens: trade routes, borders, climate and history all follow water. MapGuesser's [Find the Feature](/play/find-the-feature/) mode covers 616 seas, gulfs, bays, straits, lakes, rivers and oceans. Here are the ones worth learning first.

The five oceans

Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Southern and Arctic. The Southern Ocean is the one people forget; it surrounds Antarctica and is recognised by many maps and organisations, though not all.

The seas that separate countries

• Mediterranean Sea — between Europe, Africa and Asia; the gateway to the Atlantic and the Black Sea.
• Red Sea — between Africa and the Arabian Peninsula; the Suez Canal connects it to the Mediterranean.
• Black Sea — bordered by Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, Russia and Georgia.
• Caspian Sea — the world's largest inland body of water, bordered by five countries.
• South China Sea — a major trade route and a contested maritime region.
• Caribbean Sea — the island arc of the Greater and Lesser Antilles.

The straits that matter

A strait is a narrow passage between two larger bodies of water, and they are disproportionately important:

• Strait of Gibraltar — Europe and Africa, Atlantic and Mediterranean.
• Bosphorus — Europe and Asia, Black Sea and Sea of Marmara.
• Strait of Hormuz — the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman; a huge share of the world's oil passes through it.
• Strait of Malacca — the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea; one of the busiest shipping lanes on Earth.
• Bab-el-Mandeb — the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.
• Bering Strait — Asia and North America, between Russia and Alaska.

The rivers to know

Rivers are harder to see on a world map than seas, so learn them by continent:

• Africa: Nile, Congo, Niger, Zambezi, Orange.
• Asia: Yangtze, Yellow, Mekong, Ganges, Indus, Tigris, Euphrates.
• Europe: Volga, Danube, Rhine, Elbe, Dnieper.
• North America: Mississippi, Missouri, Colorado, Rio Grande, St. Lawrence.
• South America: Amazon, Paraná, Orinoco, São Francisco.

How to practise

The [Find the Feature](/play/find-the-feature/) mode names a feature and asks you to tap it. Small features get a mercy radius, so a near tap still counts. Start with oceans and seas, then straits, then rivers.

Pair the game with the physical clues on the [country pages](/countries/): a country's coastline and rivers explain a lot about where its cities are. Once you can find the Strait of Hormuz or the Gulf of Guinea on a blank map, the political map starts to make more sense too.