World's Principal Rivers, Ranked According to Drainage Area, Table

▪ Table

river drainage area length (km)* mean discharge

extent(000 sq km) percent (000 cu rank percent cu m/

of m/sec) order of sec/sq

world's world km

land total

area

Amazon 7,050 4.8 6,400 180 1 19.2 0.0255

Paraná 4,144 2.8 4,880 22 5 2.3 0.0052

Congo 3,457 2.3 4,700 41 2 4.4 0.0121

Nile 3,349 2.3 6,650 3 — 0.3 0.0009

Mississippi-Missouri 3,221 2.2 5,971 18 8 2.0 0.0057

Ob-Irtysh 2,975 2.0 5,410 15 10 1.7 0.0053

Yenisey 2,580 1.7 5,540 19 6 2.0 0.0073

Lena 2,490 1.7 4,400 16 9 1.7 0.0065

Yangtze 1,959 1.3 6,300 34 4 3.6 0.0174

Niger 1,890 1.3 4,200 6 — 0.7 0.0032

Amur 1,855 1.3 2,824 12 10 1.3 0.0066

Mackenzie 1,841 1.2 4,241 11 — 1.2 0.0061

Ganges-Brahmaputra 1,621 1.1 2,897 38 3 4.1 0.0237

St. Lawrence- 1,463 1.0 4,000 10 — 1.1 0.0069

Great Lakes

Volga 1,360 0.9 3,530 8 — 0.9 0.0058

Zambezi 1,330 0.9 3,500 7 — 0.8 0.0053

Indus 1,166 0.8 2,900 5 — 0.6 0.0047

Shatt al-'Arab 1,114 0.8 2,800 1 — 0.1 0.0012

(Tigris-Euphrates)

Nelson 1,072 0.7 2,575 2 — 0.2 0.0021

Murray-Darling 1,057 0.7 3,780 0.4 — 0.04 0.0003

Tocantins 906 0.6 2,699 10 — 1.1 0.0112

Danube 816 0.6 2,850 7 — 0.8 0.0088

Columbia 668 0.5 2,000 7 — 0.7 0.0104

Rio Grande 445 0.4 3,060 0.08 — 0.01 0.0001

Rhine 160 0.1 1,320 2 — 0.2 0.0137

Rhône 96 — 800 2 — 0.2 0.0177

Thames 10 — 340 0.08 — 0.01 0.0082

*Some figures are rounded to the nearest ten or hundred kilometres.

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