Yangtze River

The Yangtze River, Yangzi River or Chang Jiang (pinyin: Cháng Jiāng, Zhuyin Fuhao: ˊ, lit. 'long river') is the longest river in China and the third-longest river in the world. It rises at Jari Hill in the Tanggula Mountains of the Tibetan Plateau and flows for 6,236 kilometers (3, 875 mi), including the Dam Qu River, the longest source of the Yangtze, in a generally easterly direction to the East China Sea. It is the fifth-largest primary river by discharge volume in the world. Its drainage basin comprises one-fifth of the land area of China, and is home to nearly one-third of the country's population. The Yangtze has played a major role in the history, culture, and economy of China. For thousands of years, the river has been used for water, irrigation, sanitation, transportation, industry, boundary-marking, and war. The Yangtze Delta generates as much as 20% of China's GDP, and the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze is the largest hydro-electric power station in the world. In mid-2014, the Chinese government announced it was building a multi-tier transport network, comprising railways, roads and airports to create a new economic belt alongside the river. The Yangtze flows through a wide array of ecosystems and is a habitat for several endemic and threatened species, including the Chinese alligator and the narrow-ridged finless porpoise, and was also the home of the now extinct Yangtze river dolphin (or baij

Flows through: People's Republic of China.

River data from Wikidata (CC0); lengths normalised to a common unit.