Latitude and longitude
Every place on Earth has an address made of two angles. Drag the sliders or search a city: the magenta ring is its latitude, the blue line its longitude.
New York City, USA
40.7000° N, 74.0000° W
40° 42′ 0.0″ N, 74° 0′ 0.0″ W
At this latitude, one degree of longitude spans 84.4 km (52.5 mi). One degree of latitude is always about 111 km.
How the grid works
Latitude is the angle between the equator and a point, measured from Earth's centre. The equator is 0°, the North Pole 90° N, the South Pole 90° S. Circles of equal latitude are called parallels, and they get smaller toward the poles. Special parallels include the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn (about 23.4° N and S), where the sun is directly overhead at a solstice, and the Arctic and Antarctic Circles (about 66.6°).
Longitude is the angle east or west of the prime meridian through Greenwich. All meridians are the same length and meet at the poles. Because Earth turns 360° in 24 hours, every 15° of longitude is one hour of solar time, which is where time zones come from.
The equator
The equator (dashed on the globe) is 40,075 km around and crosses 13 countries: Ecuador, Colombia, Brazil, São Tomé and Príncipe, Gabon, the Republic of the Congo, the DR Congo, Uganda, Kenya, Somalia, the Maldives, Indonesia and Kiribati. Because Earth bulges at the equator, the summit of Chimborazo in Ecuador is the point farthest from Earth's centre, not Everest.
Decimal to degrees-minutes-seconds
48° 51′ 30.2″ N, 2° 17′ 40.2″ E
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between latitude and longitude?
Latitude measures how far north or south of the equator a place is, from 0° at the equator to 90° at the poles. Longitude measures how far east or west of the prime meridian in Greenwich, London, it is, from 0° to 180°. Lines of latitude (parallels) run east–west; lines of longitude (meridians) run north–south.
Which comes first, latitude or longitude?
Latitude comes first by convention: 40.71° N, 74.01° W is New York City. In decimal form southern latitudes and western longitudes are negative, so the same point is 40.71, -74.01.
What is the equator?
The equator is the line of 0° latitude, a circle about 40,075 km (24,901 mi) around Earth's widest point, halfway between the poles. It passes through 13 countries, including Ecuador, Colombia, Brazil, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Indonesia.
How far is one degree of latitude?
About 111 km (69 miles) everywhere. A degree of longitude is also 111 km at the equator, but shrinks to zero at the poles, because the meridians meet there. At 45° it is about 79 km.
Why is Greenwich the prime meridian?
At the International Meridian Conference in Washington, D.C. in 1884, 22 of 25 nations voted for the meridian through the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, largely because most sea charts already used it.