North America

American  

noun

1. the northern continent of the Western Hemisphere, extending from Central America to the Arctic Ocean. Highest point, Denali, 20,300 feet (6,187 meters); lowest, Death Valley, 276 feet (84 meters) below sea level. About 9,360,000 square miles (24,242,400 square kilometers).

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North America British  

noun

1. the third largest continent, linked with South America by the Isthmus of Panama and bordering on the Arctic Ocean, the N Pacific, the N Atlantic, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Caribbean. It consists generally of a great mountain system (the Western Cordillera) extending along the entire W coast, actively volcanic in the extreme north and south, with the Great Plains to the east and the Appalachians still further east, separated from the Canadian Shield by an arc of large lakes (Great Bear, Great Slave, Winnipeg, Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, Ontario); reaches its greatest height of 6194 m (20 320 ft) in Mount McKinley, Alaska, and its lowest point of 85 m (280 ft) below sea level in Death Valley, California, and ranges from snowfields, tundra, and taiga in the north to deserts in the southwest and tropical forests in the extreme south. Pop: 332 156 000 (2005 est). Area: over 24 000 000 sq km (9 500 000 sq miles)

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North America Cultural  

1. Third-largest continent (after Asia and Africa), comprising Canada, the United States, Mexico, and Central America.

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Other Word Forms

• North American
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of North America

First recorded in 1680–90

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

North America

On the Northwest Coast of North America, for instance, some Indigenous communities bred small dogs with woolly coats specifically for their hair.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 10, 2026

After leaving Wolves, he finished his playing career in North America, including spells at Vancouver Whitecaps and Chicago Sting.

From BBC ● Aug. 8, 2026

Under Armour UAA -5.33%decrease; down pointing triangle posted lower fiscal first-quarter revenue but the company swung to small profit despite a challenging environment in North America and the Asia-Pacific region.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 7, 2026

Sales are likely to be flat on year, with North America sales continuing to fall after sliding more than 8% in fiscal 2026.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 6, 2026

This brief overview of precolonial North America counteracts the settler-colonial myth of the wandering Neolithic hunter and vast unused and uncharted lands.

From "An Indigenous People’s History of the United States" by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz