California is a state on the Pacific coast of the United States. It stretches about 1,050 kilometers (650 miles) from north to south, from its border with Oregon to its border with Mexico. Because the state slants from northwest to southeast, its longest straight line, from corner to corner, is longer: about 1,340 kilometers (830 miles).

Size

California's length and width here are calculated from the U.S. Census Bureau's digital map of the state's boundary. California's northern border lies at about 42 degrees north latitude, and its southernmost point, where the Mexican border meets the Pacific, at about 32.5 degrees. That difference of about 9.5 degrees of latitude is about 1,050 kilometers.

The longest straight line across the state runs from its northwestern corner, where the Oregon border meets the Pacific, to its southeastern corner, near the borders with Arizona and Mexico. It is about 1,340 kilometers long. From west to east, California spans about 10 degrees of longitude, from its westernmost point on the Pacific coast to its easternmost point on the border with Arizona. Because lines of longitude draw closer together toward the poles, that span covers different distances at different latitudes: about 830 kilometers (515 miles) at the northern border and about 940 kilometers (585 miles) at the southern tip.

California covers 423,967 square kilometers (163,695 square miles). Only Alaska and Texas are larger.

Size comparisons

Italy is about 1,200 kilometers long, a little shorter than California's longest line. California covers about 1.4 times Italy's area.
Texas, the next larger state, covers about 1.6 times California's area.
Running California from north to south would take about 25 marathons of 42.195 kilometers (26.2 miles) each.
About 12 Californias stacked north to south would reach across Earth, which is 12,742 kilometers wide.

Highest and lowest

California holds both the highest point in the lower 48 states (the 48 U.S. states other than Alaska and Hawaii) and the lowest point in North America. Mount Whitney, the tallest mountain in the lower 48, rises to 4,421 meters (14,505 feet).

Badwater Basin, in Death Valley National Park, lies 86 meters (282 feet) below sea level, the lowest point in North America. The two points differ in height by about 4,500 meters (14,800 feet). Death Valley also holds the world record for the highest air temperature, 57 degrees Celsius (134 degrees Fahrenheit), recorded on July 10, 1913.

A long shoreline

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) measures shoreline in detail, on large-scale charts. It follows every bay, offshore island and river up to the point where the tidal water narrows to 30 meters (100 feet) wide. Measured this way, California's shoreline is 5,515 kilometers (3,427 miles) long, more than five times the state's north-to-south length.

Sources

Cartographic Boundary Files. U.S. Census Bureau, 2024.
State Area Measurements and Internal Point Coordinates. U.S. Census Bureau.
Elevations and Distances in the United States. U.S. Geological Survey.
Seeing and Climbing Mt. Whitney. Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks, National Park Service.
Badwater Basin. Death Valley National Park, National Park Service, 2026.
Weather. Death Valley National Park, National Park Service.
Shoreline Mileage of the United States. NOAA Office for Coastal Management.
Annuario statistico italiano 2016, Capitolo 1: Territorio. ISTAT, 2016.
Marathon. World Athletics.
Earth Fact Sheet. NASA, 2024.

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