At ,

Namibia Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country on the west coast of Southern Africa. Its borders include the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south; in the no ...

is the world's thirty-fourth largest country. After

Mongolia Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south and southeast. It covers an area of , with a population of 3.5 million, making it the world's List of countries and dependencies by po ...

, Namibia is the second least densely populated country in the world (). Namibia got its name from the

Namib The Namib ( ; ) is a coastal desert in Southern Africa. According to the broadest definition, the Namib stretches for more than along the Atlantic coasts of Angola, Namibia, and northwest South Africa, extending southward from the Carunjamba Ri ...

desert that stretches along the coast of the

Atlantic The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the Age of Discovery, it was known for se ...

. It is also known for its wildlife.

Geographical areas

The Namibian landscape consists generally of five geographical areas, each with characteristic abiotic conditions and vegetation with some variation within and overlap between them: the Central Plateau, the

Namib Desert The Namib ( ; ) is a coastal desert in Southern Africa. According to the broadest definition, the Namib stretches for more than along the Atlantic coasts of Angola, Namibia, and northwest South Africa, extending southward from the Carunjamba Ri ...

, the Great Escarpment, the

Bushveld The Bushveld (from Afrikaans: ''bosveld'', Afrikaans: ''bos'' 'bush' and ) is a Tropical and subtropical grasslands, savannas, and shrublands, sub-tropical woodland ecoregion of Southern Africa. The ecoregion straddles the Tropic of Capricorn ...

, and the

Kalahari Desert The Kalahari Desert is a large semiarid climate, semiarid sandy savanna in Southern Africa covering including much of Botswana as well as parts of Namibia and South Africa. It is not to be confused with the Angolan, Namibian, and South African ...

Central Plateau

The Central Plateau runs from north to south, bordered by the Skeleton Coast to the northwest, the Namib Desert and its coastal plains to the southwest, the

Orange River The Orange River (from Afrikaans/Dutch language, Dutch: ''Oranjerivier'') is a river in Southern Africa. It is the longest river in South Africa. With a total length of , the Orange River Basin extends from Lesotho into South Africa and Namibi ...

to the south, and the Kalahari Desert to the east. The Central Plateau is home to the highest point in Namibia at Königstein elevation .Landsat.usgs.gov
Within the wide, flat Central Plateau is the majority of Namibia's population and economic activity.

Windhoek Windhoek (; ; ) is the capital and largest city of Namibia. It is located in central Namibia in the Khomas Highland plateau area, at around above sea level, almost exactly at the country's geographical centre. The population of Windhoek, which ...

, the nation's capital, is located here, as well as most of the arable land. Although arable land accounts for only 1% of Namibia, nearly 1/3rd of the population is employed in agriculture.World Almanac. 2004. The abiotic conditions here are similar to those found along the Escarpment; however, the topographic complexity is reduced. Summer temperatures in the area can reach , and frosts are common in the winter.

Namib Desert

The

is a broad expanse of hyper-arid gravel, gravel with no moisture, plains, and dunes that stretches along the entire coastline, which varies in width between 100 and many hundreds of kilometres. Areas within the Namib include the Skeleton Coast and the Kaokoveld in the north and the extensive Namib Sand Sea along the central coast.Spriggs, A. 2001.(AT1315) The sands that make up the sand sea are a consequence of erosional processes that take place within the Orange River valley and areas farther to the south. As sand-laden waters drop their suspended loads into the Atlantic, onshore currents deposit them along the shore. The prevailing southwest winds then pick up and redeposit the sand in the form of massive dunes in the widespread sand sea, the largest sand dunes in the world. In areas where the supply of sand is reduced because of the inability of the sand to cross riverbeds, the winds also scour the land to form large gravel plains. In many areas within the Namib Desert, there is little vegetation with the exception of lichens found in the gravel plains, and in dry river beds where plants can access subterranean water. " Fairy circles", which are circular patches of land barren of plants, varying between 2 in diameter and often encircled by a ring of stimulated growth of grass, are found in the Namib, such as those near the Wolwedans desert camp.

Great Escarpment

The Great Escarpment swiftly rises to over . Average temperatures and temperature ranges increase as you move farther inland from the cold Atlantic waters, while the lingering coastal fogs slowly diminish. Although the area is rocky with poorly developed soils, it is nonetheless significantly more productive than the Namib Desert. As summer winds are forced over the Escarpment, moisture is extracted as precipitation.Spriggs, A. 2001.(AT1316) The water, along with rapidly changing topography, is responsible for the creation of microhabitats which offer a wide range of organisms, many of them endemic. Vegetation along the escarpment varies in both form and density, with community structure ranging from dense woodlands to more shrubby areas with scattered trees. A number of

Acacia ''Acacia'', commonly known as wattles or acacias, is a genus of about of shrubs and trees in the subfamily Mimosoideae of the pea family Fabaceae. Initially, it comprised a group of plant species native to Africa, South America, and Austral ...

species are found here, as well as grasses and other shrub vegetation.

Bushveld

The Bushveld is found in northeastern Namibia along the

Angola Angola, officially the Republic of Angola, is a country on the west-Central Africa, central coast of Southern Africa. It is the second-largest Portuguese-speaking world, Portuguese-speaking (Lusophone) country in both total area and List of c ...

n border and in the Caprivi Strip which is the vestige of a narrow corridor demarcated for the

German Empire The German Empire (),; ; World Book, Inc. ''The World Book dictionary, Volume 1''. World Book, Inc., 2003. p. 572. States that Deutsches Reich translates as "German Realm" and was a former official name of Germany. also referred to as Imperia ...

to access the

Zambezi River The Zambezi (also spelled Zambeze and Zambesi) is the fourth-longest river in Africa, the longest east-flowing river in Africa and the largest flowing into the Indian Ocean from Africa. Its drainage basin covers , slightly less than half of t ...

. The area receives a significantly greater amount of precipitation than the rest of the country, averaging around per year. Temperatures are also cooler and more moderate, with approximate seasonal variations of between . The area is generally flat and the soils sandy, limiting their ability to retain water.Cowling, S. 2001. Located adjacent to the Bushveld in north-central Namibia is one of nature's most spectacular features: the

Etosha Pan The Etosha Pan is a large endorheic salt pan, forming part of the Cuvelai-Etosha Basin in the north of Namibia. It is a vast hollow in the ground in which water may collect or in which a deposit of salt remains after water has evaporated. The 1 ...

. For most of the year, it is a dry, saline wasteland, but during the wet season, it forms a shallow lake covering more than . The area is ecologically important and vital to the large numbers of birds and animals from the surrounding

savannah A savanna or savannah is a mixed woodland-grassland (i.e. grassy woodland) biome and ecosystem characterised by the trees being sufficiently widely spaced so that the canopy does not close. The open canopy allows sufficient light to reach th ...

that gather in the region as summer drought forces them to the scattered waterholes that ring the pan. The Bushveld area has been demarcated by the

World Wildlife Fund The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) is a Swiss-based international non-governmental organization founded in 1961 that works in the field of wilderness preservation and the reduction of human impact on the environment. It was formerly named the ...

as part of the

Angolan mopane woodlands Angolan mopane woodlands are situated in southwestern Angola, extending into northern Namibia. This ecosystem surrounds Etosha Pan, which is considered a separate ecoregion. The mopane trees are the main type of vegetation. Location and descript ...

ecoregion An ecoregion (ecological region) is an ecological and geographic area that exists on multiple different levels, defined by type, quality, and quantity of environmental resources. Ecoregions cover relatively large areas of land or water, and c ...

, which extends north across the

Cunene River The Cunene (Portuguese spelling) or Kunene (common Namibian spelling) is a river in Southern Africa. It flows from the Angola highlands southwards to the border with Namibia. It then flows in a westerly direction along the border until it reaches ...

into neighbouring

Kalahari Desert

The

is perhaps Namibia's best-known geographical feature. Shared with South Africa and

Botswana Botswana, officially the Republic of Botswana, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory part of the Kalahari Desert. It is bordered by South Africa to the sou ...

, it has a variety of localised environments ranging from hyper-arid sandy desert to areas that seem to defy the common definition of desert. One of these areas, known as the

Succulent Karoo The Succulent Karoo is an terrestrial ecoregion, ecoregion defined by the World Wide Fund for Nature to include regions of deserts and xeric shrublands, desert in South Africa and Namibia, and a biodiversity hotspot. The geographic area chosen ...

, is home to over 5,000 species of plants, nearly half of them endemic; fully one-third of the world's succulents are found in the Karoo. The reason behind this high productivity and endemism may be the relatively stable nature of precipitation.Spriggs, A. 2001.(AT0709) The Karoo apparently does not experience drought regularly, so even though the area is technically a desert, regular winter rains provide enough moisture to support the region's interesting plant community. Another feature of the Kalahari, indeed many parts of Namibia, are

inselberg An inselberg or monadnock ( ) is an isolated rock hill, knob, ridge, or small mountain that rises abruptly from a gently sloping or virtually level surrounding plain. In Southern Africa, a similar formation of granite is known as a koppie, an ...

s, isolated mountains that create microclimates and habitats for organisms not adapted to life in the surrounding desert matrix.

Coastal Desert

Namibia's Coastal Desert is one of the oldest deserts in the world. Its sand dunes, created by the strong onshore winds, are the highest in the world. The Namib Desert and the

Namib-Naukluft National Park The Namib-Naukluft National Park is a national park in western Namibia, situated between the coast of the Atlantic Ocean and the edge of the Great Escarpment. It encompasses part of the Namib Desert (considered the world's oldest desert), the ...

are located here. The Namibian coastal deserts are the richest source of

diamond Diamond is a Allotropes of carbon, solid form of the element carbon with its atoms arranged in a crystal structure called diamond cubic. Diamond is tasteless, odourless, strong, brittle solid, colourless in pure form, a poor conductor of e ...

s on earth, making Namibia the world's largest producer of diamonds. It is divided into the northern Skeleton Coast and the southern Diamond Coast. Because of the location of the shoreline—at the point where the Atlantic's cold water reaches Africa—there is often extremely dense fog. Sandy beach comprises 54% and mixed sand and rock add another 28%. Only 16% of the total length is rocky shoreline. The coastal plains are dune fields, gravel plains covered with

lichen A lichen ( , ) is a hybrid colony (biology), colony of algae or cyanobacteria living symbiotically among hypha, filaments of multiple fungus species, along with yeasts and bacteria embedded in the cortex or "skin", in a mutualism (biology), m ...

and some scattered salt pans. Near the coast, there are areas where the dunes are vegetated with hammocks. Namibia has rich coastal and marine resources that remain largely unexplored. File:SAC Namibia-cactus.jpg, Fish River Canyon. File:SAC Namibia-desert-1.jpg,

. File:SAC Namibia-escarpment2.jpg, Namib Escarpment. File:Kalahari C17.JPG, The

. File:Windhoek-Skyline.jpg,

skyline. File:Namibia’s Protected Coast.jpg, Natural-colour satellite image of the Namibian coast.

Weather and climate

has more than 300 days of sunshine per year. It is situated at the southern edge of the tropics; the

Tropic of Capricorn The Tropic of Capricorn (or the Southern Tropic) is the circle of latitude that contains the subsolar point at the December (or southern) solstice. It is thus the southernmost latitude where the Sun can be seen directly overhead. It also reach ...

cuts the country about in half. The winter (June–August) is generally dry, both rainy seasons occur in summer, the small rainy season between September and November, and the big one between February and April. Humidity is low, and average rainfall varies from almost zero in the coastal desert to more than in the Caprivi Strip. Rainfall is however highly variable, and droughts are common. A bad rainy season occurred in the summer of 2006/07. Very low rainfall was recorded in 2019. Due to the dry winters snowfall constitutes a very rare occurrence and prompts media coverage whenever it happens. The snow was reported at Spreetshoogte Pass in the Namib-Naukluft Park in June 2011. Weather and climate in the coastal area are dominated by the cold, north-flowing

Benguela Current The Benguela Current is the broad, northward flowing ocean current that forms the eastern portion of the South Atlantic Ocean gyre. The current extends from roughly Cape Point in the south, to the position of the Angola-Benguela Front in the no ...

of the Atlantic Ocean which accounts for very low

precipitation In meteorology, precipitation is any product of the condensation of atmospheric water vapor that falls from clouds due to gravitational pull. The main forms of precipitation include drizzle, rain, rain and snow mixed ("sleet" in Commonwe ...

totalling per year or less, frequent dense fog, and overall lower temperatures than in the rest of the country. In winter, occasionally a condition known as '' Berg wind'' or ''Oosweer'' (

Afrikaans Afrikaans is a West Germanic languages, West Germanic language spoken in South Africa, Namibia and to a lesser extent Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe and also Argentina where there is a group in Sarmiento, Chubut, Sarmiento that speaks the Pat ...

: East weather) occurs, a hot dry wind blowing from the inland to the coast. As the area behind the coast is a desert, these winds can develop into sand storms with sand deposits in the Atlantic Ocean visible on satellite images. The Central Plateau and Kalahari areas have wide diurnal temperature ranges of up to .

Examples

Water sources

Namibia is the driest country in

sub-Saharan Africa Sub-Saharan Africa is the area and regions of the continent of Africa that lie south of the Sahara. These include Central Africa, East Africa, Southern Africa, and West Africa. Geopolitically, in addition to the list of sovereign states and ...

and depends largely on groundwater. With an average rainfall of about per annum, the highest rainfall occurs in the Caprivi in the northeast (about per annum) and decreases in a westerly and southwesterly direction to as little as and less per annum at the coast. The only perennial rivers are found on the national borders with

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

Zambia Zambia, officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country at the crossroads of Central Africa, Central, Southern Africa, Southern and East Africa. It is typically referred to being in South-Central Africa or Southern Africa. It is bor ...

, and the short border with

in the Caprivi. In the interior of the country, surface water is available only in the summer months when rivers are in flood after exceptional rainfalls. Otherwise, surface water is restricted to a few large storage dams retaining and damming up these seasonal floods and their runoff. Where people do not live near perennial rivers or make use of storage dams, they are dependent on groundwater. Even isolated communities and those economic activities located far from good surface water sources, such as mining, agriculture, and tourism, can be supplied from groundwater over nearly 80% of the country. The longest river in Namibia is the Fish River with a length of . More than 120,000

borehole A borehole is a narrow shaft bored in the ground, either vertically or horizontally. A borehole may be constructed for many different purposes, including the extraction of water ( drilled water well and tube well), other liquids (such as petr ...

s have been drilled in Namibia over the past century. One-third of these boreholes have been drilled dry. An

aquifer An aquifer is an underground layer of water-bearing material, consisting of permeability (Earth sciences), permeable or fractured rock, or of unconsolidated materials (gravel, sand, or silt). Aquifers vary greatly in their characteristics. The s ...

called "Ohangwena II", located on both sides of the Angola-Namibia border, was discovered in 2012. This aquifer has been estimated to be capable of supplying the 800,000 people in the North for 400 years, at the current (2018) rate of consumption. Experts estimate that Namibia has of underground water. ''Efundja'', the annual flooding of the northern parts of the country, often causes not only damage to infrastructure but loss of life. The rains that cause these floods originate in Angola, flow into Namibia's Cuvelai basin, and fill the ''Oshanas'' ( Oshiwambo: flood plains) there. The worst floods occurred in March 2011 and displaced 21,000 people.

Urbanization

The capital and largest city, Windhoek, is in the centre of the country. It is home to the country's Central Administrative Region, Windhoek Hosea Kutako International Airport, and the country's railhead. Other important towns are: * Arandis, uranium mine *

Walvis Bay Walvis Bay (; ; ) is a city in Namibia and the name of the bay on which it lies. It is the List of cities in Namibia, second largest city in Namibia and the largest coastal city in the country. The city covers an area of of land. The bay is a ...

, seaport, international airport, railhead *

Oshakati Oshakati is a town in northern Namibia. It is the regional capital of the Oshana Region and one of Namibia's largest cities both by population and as an economic center. It had a population of 58,656 people in 2023. Oshakati was founded i ...

, main business centre in the North, railhead *

Otjiwarongo Otjiwarongo (Herero language, Herero for "beautiful place") is a city of 49,000 inhabitants in the Otjozondjupa Region of Namibia. It is the district capital of the Otjiwarongo Constituency, Otjiwarongo electoral constituency and also the capital ...

, main business centre in Central-North, rail junction * Lüderitz, sea port, railhead * Gobabis, farming centre *

Keetmanshoop Keetmanshoop is a town in the ǁKaras Region of southern Namibia. It is named after , a German Empire, German industrialist and benefactor of the city. Keetmanshoop had a population of 27,862 people in 2023. History Before the colonial era, ...

, railhead *

Tsumeb Tsumeb (; ) is a city of around 35,000 inhabitants and the largest town in the Oshikoto Region, Oshikoto region in northern Namibia. Tsumeb, since its founding in 1905, has been primarily a mining town. The town is the site of a deep mine (the ...

, mining *

Swakopmund Swakopmund ("Mouth of the Swakop River, Swakop") is a city on the coast of western Namibia, west of the Namibian capital Windhoek via the B2 road (Namibia), B2 main road. It is the capital of the Erongo Region, Erongo administrative district. It ...

, Tourism (Ex German Colonial town) *

Rundu Rundu is the capital and the largest city of the Kavango-East Region in northern Namibia. It lies on the border with Angola on the banks of the Kavango River, about above sea level. Rundu's population is growing rapidly. The 2001 census counted ...

, * Katima Mulilo * Okahandja

Statistics

Location: Southern Africa, bordering the South Atlantic Ocean, between

and South Africa

Geographic coordinates A geographic coordinate system (GCS) is a spherical or geodetic coordinate system for measuring and communicating positions directly on Earth as latitude and longitude. It is the simplest, oldest, and most widely used type of the various ...

: ;Area: :*Total: 824,292 km² :**''country rank in the world:'' 34th :*Land: 823,290 km² :*Water: 1,002 km² ; Area comparative :* Australia comparative: slightly larger than

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

:* Canada comparative: approximately smaller than

British Columbia British Columbia is the westernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Situated in the Pacific Northwest between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains, the province has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that ...

:* United States comparative: slightly less than three times the size of

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...

:* EU comparative: slightly less than 2 times the size of

Finland Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It borders Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, ...

Land boundaries:
''total:'' 4,220 km
''border countries:'' Angola 1,427 km,

1,544 km, South Africa 1,005 km,

244 km Coastline: 1,572 km Maritime claims:
''territorial sea:''
''contiguous zone:''
''exclusive economic zone:'' and Terrain: Mostly high plateau;

along the coast;

in the east. In the north near the border with

there is a flat area that has been designated by the

as part of the

. Elevation extremes:
''lowest point:'' Atlantic Ocean 0 m
''mean elevation:'' 1,414 m
''highest point:'' Königstein 2,573 m Natural resources: diamonds, copper, uranium, gold, silver, lead, tin, lithium, cadmium, tungsten, zinc, salt, hydropower, fish
''note:'' suspected deposits of oil, coal, and iron ore Land use:
''agricultural land:'' 47.2% (2018)
''arable land:'' 1% (2018)
''permanent crops:'' 0% (2018)
''permanent pasture:'' 46.2% (2018)
''forest:'' 8.8% (2018)
''other:'' 44% (2018) Irrigated land: 80 km² (2012), 75.73 km² (2003), 70 km² (1998 est.), 60 km² (1993 est.) Total renewable water resources: 17.72 km³ (2011) Natural hazards: prolonged periods of drought Environment – current issues: depletion and degradation of water and aquatic resources;

desertification Desertification is a type of gradual land degradation of Soil fertility, fertile land into arid desert due to a combination of natural processes and human activities. The immediate cause of desertification is the loss of most vegetation. This i ...

;

land degradation Land degradation is a process where land becomes less healthy and productive due to a combination of Human impact on the environment, human activities or natural conditions. The causes for land degradation are numerous and complex. Human activitie ...

; loss of biodiversity and biotic resources; wildlife

poaching Poaching is the illegal hunting or capturing of wild animals, usually associated with land use rights. Poaching was once performed by impoverished peasants for subsistence purposes and to supplement meager diets. It was set against the huntin ...

Environment – international agreements:
''party to:'' Antarctic-Marine Living Resources, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Desertification, Endangered Species, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Ozone Layer Protection, Wetlands

Extreme points

This is a list of the extreme points of Namibia, the points that are farther north, south, east, or west than any other location. * Northernmost point – unnamed location on the border with

in the Kunene River immediately west of the Epupa Falls,

Kunene Region Kunene is one of the fourteen regions of Namibia. Its capital is Opuwo, its governor is Vipuakuje Muharukua. The region's name comes from the Kunene River which forms the northern border with Angola. Geography Besides the capital Opuwo, the reg ...

* Easternmost point – the

tripoint A triple border, tripoint, trijunction, triple point, or tri-border area is a geography, geographical point at which the boundaries of three countries or Administrative division, subnational entities meet. There are 175 international tripoints ...

with

and

Zambezi Region The Zambezi Region, known as the Caprivi Region until 2013, is one of Namibia's fourteen regions, situated in the north-eastern part of the country along the Zambezi River. The region's capital is Katima Mulilo. The Katima Mulilo Airport is ...

* Southernmost point – unnamed location in Pella Drift on the

border with South Africa, ǁKaras Region * Westernmost point – unnamed section of coast west of the Okotuso well,

Sources

* Atlas of Namibia Team, 2022
Atlas of Namibia: its land, water and life
Namibia Nature Foundation, Windhoek

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Geography of Namibia