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Alaska travel guide

How Big is Alaska?

This post is part of our ongoing Alaska FAQ series, answering commonly asked questions about the state.

Short answer: Really, really big. To many travelers from Europe and the rest of the world, the United States can seem dauntingly large, and that’s just the lower 48 states. Alaska is by far the largest of the 50 US states, and we’ve compiled a list of facts on Alaska’s size that should help explain just how massive the Great Land really is:

  • Total land area: 663,268 square miles (1,717,854 sq. km.)
  • More land area than the 2nd, 3rd and 4th biggest states combined
  • More land area than the 22 smallest states combined
  • More miles of coastline than the other 49 states combined
  • If Alaska was a country, it would be the 19th largest in the world
  • Because of the Aleutian Island chain, Alaska is over 2,200 miles wide from end to end, more than the distance from Madrid to Cairo.
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Alaska travel guide

How long are the days in Alaska?

2645590772_f85954c364This post is part of our ongoing Alaska FAQ series, answering commonly asked questions about the state.

Among the many nicknames for Alaska, the best-known is probably “Land of the Midnight Sun”. This refers to the fact that, in summer, there is sunlight well into the night-time hours. This is true of all high-latitude regions, but Alaska is one of the most famous places to experience the longest summer days.

But how long are the days really? Because of the huge range of latitudes that Alaska covers, from about 56 degrees North in Wrangell (Southeast Alaska) and 71 degrees North in Barrow, the daylight hours also vary across the state. In Barrow, there is no real darkness for three months, while in Anchorage there are about 19 hours in the longest day of the year.

Obviously, the actual amount of sunlight varies a bit day to day, and can also be affected by the weather. It will be lighter for more hours on a clear day than through heavy clouds.

Below is a table of the daylight hours for a few cities and towns in Alaska, in order from South to North. Note that in April and September, there is virtually the same amount of daylight throughout the state, and how the differences increase as you get closer to the Summer and Winter solstices.

City Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
Juneau 6:30 8:15 10:35 13:15 15:45 17:50 18:10 16:30 14:00 11:30 8:55 6:55
  Anchorage     5:40     7:45     10:25     13:20     16:50     18:45     19:10     17:05     14:15     11:25     8:30     6:10  
Fairbanks 4:00 6:55 10:05 13:35 17:00 20:35 21:25 18:10 14:40 11:20 7:50 4:45
Barrow 0:00 4:05 9:20 14:15 19:45 24:00 24:00 24:00 14:45 11:05 5:50 0:00