Canada Geography

Canada is the world's second-largest country by area, spanning six time zones from the Atlantic to the Pacific, with the Arctic Ocean forming its entire northern border. Its geography splits broadly into the Atlantic provinces' rocky coastline, the flat, fertile prairies of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, and the Rocky Mountains running along the western edge of Alberta and through British Columbia.

The Canadian Shield, an enormous expanse of ancient rock, lakes, and boreal forest, covers roughly half the country's landmass, stretching from Ontario and Quebec north into the territories -- one of the reasons Canada has more lakes than the rest of the world combined. The Great Lakes, shared with the United States, sit along the country's most densely populated stretch.

The north -- Yukon, the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut -- makes up more than a third of Canada's landmass but holds a tiny fraction of its population, dominated by tundra, Arctic islands, and, in the Yukon, Mount Logan, Canada's tallest mountain.