What is the largest state by area?

Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area, covering about 663,300 square miles, more than twice the size of Texas (the second largest state at about 268,600 square miles) and about one fifth the area of the lower 48 states combined.

The United States purchased Alaska from Russia for 7.2 million dollars on March 30, 1867 in a deal negotiated by Secretary of State William H. Seward and ratified by the Senate on April 9, 1867. The price worked out to roughly 2 cents per acre. The deal was widely ridiculed at the time as Seward's Folly or Seward's Icebox, but it has proven extraordinarily valuable.

Russia had explored and claimed Alaska beginning with Vitus Bering's 1741 voyage and had established the Russian-American Company in 1799 to manage fur trade and minimal colonial settlement, but the colony was unprofitable and impossible to defend against potential British or American expansion. Alaska remained a federal department, then a district, then an organized territory after 1912, before becoming the 49th state on January 3, 1959 with the formal admission proclaimed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

The state extends from latitude 51 degrees north on the Aleutian Islands to 71 degrees north at Point Barrow, and from longitude 130 degrees west on the Inside Passage to 172 degrees east on Attu Island in the Aleutians. The Aleutian chain crosses the 180th meridian, technically making part of Alaska in the Eastern Hemisphere and giving the United States both the easternmost and westernmost points in the country.

Alaska contains 17 of the 20 highest mountain peaks in the United States, including Denali at 20,310 feet, the highest peak in North America. It has more coastline than all other U.S. states combined, more than 6,640 miles of general coastline and 33,904 miles when measured in detail. The state contains about 100,000 glaciers, more than 3,000 named rivers, and 3 million lakes. About 17 percent of Alaska is covered by glaciers and ice fields.

The population in the 2020 census was 733,391, ranking 48th, but the state's land area gives it the lowest population density in the country at about 1.3 people per square mile. The capital is Juneau, accessible only by sea or air. Major cities include Anchorage (about 290,000), Fairbanks, and Ketchikan.

Alaska's economy is dominated by oil and gas extraction, fishing, mining, tourism, and federal employment. The 1968 discovery of oil at Prudhoe Bay led to the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System completed in 1977. Alaska Native peoples include Iñupiat, Yupik, Aleut, Athabascan, Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian groups.