Proper noun

Singular North America

Plural -

North America

1. The continent that is the northern part of the Americas; that part east of the Pacific Ocean, west of the Atlantic Ocean, north of South America and south of the Arctic Ocean, and consisting of the following countries:

Mainland

• Canada
• Mexico
• United States

Caribbean

• Anguilla (British dependency)
• Antigua and Barbuda
• Aruba (part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands)
• Bahamas
• Barbados
• Bermuda (British dependency)
• British Virgin Islands (British dependency)
• Cayman Islands (British dependency)
• Cuba
• Dominica
• Dominican Republic
• Grenada
• Guadeloupe (overseas department of France)
• Haiti
• Jamaica
• Martinique (overseas department of France)
• Montserrat (British dependency)
• Netherlands Antilles (part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands)
• Puerto Rico (U.S. free associated state)
• Saint Kitts and Nevis
• Saint Lucia
• Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
• Trinidad and Tobago
• Turks and Caicos Islands (British dependency)
• U.S. Virgin Islands (territory of the USA)

Northern Atlantic

• Greenland (a self-governing dependency of Denmark)

Central America

• Belize
• Costa Rica
• El Salvador
• Guatemala
• Honduras
• Nicaragua
• Panama

North America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and almost totally in the western hemisphere. It is bordered on the north by the Arctic Ocean, on the east by the North Atlantic Ocean, on the southeast by the Caribbean Sea, and on the west by the North Pacific Ocean; South America lies to the southeast. North America covers an area of about 24,709,000 square kilometers (9,540,000 square miles), about 4.8% of the planet's surface or about 16.5% of its land area. As of July 2008, its population was estimated at nearly 529 million people. It is the third-largest continent in area, following Asia and Africa, and the fourth in population after Asia, Africa, and Europe.

History