United States

American  

[yoo-nahy-tid steyts] / juˈnaɪ tɪd ˈsteɪts /

noun

(used with a singular verb)

1. Official Name United States of America.  a federal republic in the northern Western Hemisphere comprising 48 contiguous states, the District of Columbia, Alaska in North America, and Hawaii in the North Pacific, and in some contexts considered along with its five inhabited island territories (Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, North Mariana Islands,American Samoa ). Conterminous United States, 3,119,885 square miles (8,080,465 square kilometers); with Alaska and Hawaii, 3,796,742 square miles (9,833,517 square kilometers); all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the island territories, 3,805,927 square miles (9,857,306 square kilometers) Washington, D.C. U.S., US

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Other Word Forms

• anti–United States
  adjective
• pro–United States
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of United States

First recorded in 1600–10, in reference to the United Provinces of the Netherlands, and in 1770–80 for the United States of America ( def. )

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

United States

It justifies the name change by saying that the deepest part of the lake is on the American side, meaning that the United States "claims most of the Lake's volume."

From Barron's ● Aug. 27, 2026

It’s one of the busiest freight corridors in the United States, and it’s getting cleaner.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 27, 2026

Prostate cancer remains a major health concern both in the United States and globally.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 27, 2026

For the next 90 days, he said, the United States would allow as much as 300,000 metric tons of imported product for ground beef to enter the country without the usual out-of-quota tariff.

From Salon ● Aug. 27, 2026

Knowing that something that seemed so 100 percent right, like saving the president of the United States, could actually have catastrophic consequences didn’t make it feel any less awful.

From "Glitch" by Laura Martin