Alaska

American  

[uh-las-kuh] / əˈlæs kə /

noun

1. a state of the United States in northwestern North America. 586,400 sq. mi. (1,519,000 sq. km). Juneau. AK (for use with zip code), Alas.

2. Gulf of Alaska, a gulf of the Pacific Ocean, on the coast of southern Alaska.

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Alaska British  

/ əˈlæskə /

noun

1. Abbreviation: Alas.   AK.  the largest state of the US, in the extreme northwest of North America: the aboriginal inhabitants are Inuit and Yupik; the earliest White settlements were made by the Russians; it was purchased by the US from Russia in 1867. It is mostly mountainous and volcanic, rising over 6000 m (20 000 ft), with the Yukon basin in the central region; large areas are covered by tundra; it has important mineral resources (chiefly coal, oil, and natural gas). Capital: Juneau. Pop: 648 818 (2003 est). Area: 1 530 694 sq km (591 004 sq miles)

2. the N part of the Pacific, between the Alaska Peninsula and the Alexander Archipelago

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Alaska Cultural  

1. State in northwesternmost North America bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north; Yukon, Canada, to the east; the Pacific Ocean to the south; and the Bering Sea to the west. Its capital is Juneau, and its largest city is Anchorage.

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Discover More

The forty-ninth state, admitted in 1959, and the largest.

Other Word Forms

• Alaskan adjective

Compare meaning

How does alaska compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

• Alaska vs. Hawaii

Example Sentences

The acquisitions of Louisiana in 1803 and Alaska in 1867 were widely criticized at the time.

From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 8, 2026

So far, just two—Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Rep. Nathaniel Moran of Texas—have directly criticized Trump over his threat.

From Slate • Apr. 8, 2026

The death has been ruled an accident by the Alaska Department of Health.

From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 6, 2026

Understanding how individual rivers respond to warming is challenging because direct measurements in northern Alaska are limited.

From Science Daily • Apr. 4, 2026

Four such bodies were in existence already–in Hawaii, California, Alaska, and Washington–but oddly none in the largest volcanic zone in the world.

From "A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson