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This is a list of the largest deserts in the world by area. It includes all deserts above 50,000 km 2 (19,300 sq mi). Some of Earth's biggest non-polar deserts. Rank Name
Sahara Desert – Africa's largest desert and the world's largest hot desert which covers much of North Africa comprising: Ténéré – a desert covering northeastern Niger and western Chad Sahara Desert; Tanezrouft – a desert covering northern Mali, northwestern Niger as well as central and southern Algeria, at the west of the Hoggar Mountains
The world's largest non-polar deserts. Deserts occupy about one third of Earth's land surface. [6] Bottomlands may be salt-covered flats. Eolian processes are major factors in shaping desert landscapes. Polar deserts (also seen as "cold deserts") have similar features, except the main form of precipitation is snow rather than rain.
The Atacama Desert (Spanish: Desierto de Atacama) is a desert plateau located on the Pacific coast of South America, in the north of Chile.Stretching over a 1,600-kilometre-long (1,000-mile) strip of land west of the Andes Mountains, it covers an area of 105,000 km 2 (41,000 sq mi), [2] which increases to 128,000 km 2 (49,000 sq mi) if the barren lower slopes of the Andes are included.
The Nama Karoo of Namibia has the world's richest desert fauna. [8] The Chihuahuan desert and Central Mexican matorral are the richest deserts in the Neotropics. [9] The Carnarvon xeric shrublands of Australia are a regional center for endemism. [1] The Sonoran and Baja deserts of Mexico are unusual desert communities dominated by giant ...
The largest hot desert in the world, the Sahara, covers 9 million square kilometres (3.5 × 10 ^ 6 sq mi) and contains several ergs, such as the Chech Erg and the Issaouane Erg in Algeria. [5] Approximately 85% of all the Earth's mobile sand is found in ergs that are greater than 32,000 km 2 (12,355 sq mi), [ 6 ] the largest being the Rub' al ...
The desert climate or arid climate (in the Köppen climate classification BWh and BWk) is a dry climate sub-type in which there is a severe excess of evaporation over precipitation. The typically bald, rocky, or sandy surfaces in desert climates are dry and hold little moisture, quickly evaporating the already little rainfall they receive.
The Gobi Desert is the fastest expanding desert on Earth, as it transforms over 3,600 square kilometres (1,400 square miles) of grassland into wasteland annually. [58] Although the Gobi Desert itself is still a distance away from Beijing , reports from field studies state there are large sand dunes forming only 70 km (43.5 mi) outside the city.