page_title: Great Lakes
section_title: Geography
hierarchical_section_title: Great Lakes / Geography
caption_attribution_description: English: A map of the Great Lakes Basin showing the five sub-basins within: Erie (yellow), Huron (pale green), Michigan (cyan), Ontario (light coral), and Superior (magenta).
context_page_description: The Great Lakes or the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes in the upper mid-east region of North America, that connect to the Atlantic Ocean through the Saint Lawrence River. In general, they are on or near the Canada–United States border. They are lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario. Hydrologically, there are only four lakes, because lakes Michigan and Huron join at the Straits of Mackinac. The lakes form the basis for Great Lakes Waterway.
  The Great Lakes are the largest group of freshwater lakes on Earth by total area, and second-largest by total volume, containing 21% of the world's surface fresh water by volume. The total surface is 94,250 square miles, and the total volume is 5,439 cubic miles, slightly less than the volume of Lake Baikal. Due to their sea-like characteristics the five Great Lakes have also long been referred to as inland seas. Lake Superior is the second-largest lake in the world by area, and the largest freshwater lake by surface area. Lake Michigan is the largest lake that is entirely within one country.
context_section_description: Though the five lakes lie in separate basins, they form a single, naturally interconnected body of fresh water, within the Great Lakes Basin. As a chain of lakes and rivers they connect the east-central interior of North America to the Atlantic Ocean. From the interior to the outlet at the Saint Lawrence River, water flows from Superior to Huron and Michigan, southward to Erie, and finally northward to Lake Ontario. The lakes drain a large watershed via many rivers, and are studded with approximately 35,000 islands. There are also several thousand smaller lakes, often called "inland lakes", within the basin. The surface area of the five primary lakes combined is roughly equal to the size of the United Kingdom, while the surface area of the entire basin (the lakes and the land they drain) is about the size of the UK and France combined. Lake Michigan is the only one of the Great Lakes that is entirely within the United States; the others form a water boundary between the United States and Canada. The lakes are divided among the jurisdictions of the Canadian province of Ontario and the U.S. states of Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York. Both the province of Ontario and the state of Michigan include in their boundaries portions of four of the lakes: The province of Ontario does not border Lake Michigan, and the state of Michigan does not border Lake Ontario. New York and Wisconsin's jurisdictions extend into two lakes, and each of the remaining states into one of the lakes.
caption: A map of the Great Lakes Basin showing the five sub-basins within. Left to right they are: Superior, including Nipigon's basin, (magenta); Michigan (blue); Huron (green); Erie (yellow); Ontario (orange).
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