U.S. Regions Explained: Census Regions, Cultural Regions and Belts

The official Census map, the regions Americans talk about, and the landforms underneath them.

Geographers divide the United States in three main ways. The first is official: the Census Bureau groups the 50 states and D.C. into four regions and nine divisions, the framework behind most federal statistics. The second comes from the vocabulary of AP Human Geography. A formal region shares a measurable trait, such as a state line, a language or a crop. A functional region is organized around a central node, like a metro area tied to its downtown or a TV market. A perceptual, or vernacular, region exists mainly in people’s heads, with edges everyone draws a little differently.

The third way is physical. Physiographic provinces, first mapped by Nevin Fenneman in the early 20th century and still used by the U.S. Geological Survey, group land by rock, structure and landform. This guide covers all three: the four Census regions, the cultural regions and belts people actually talk about, and five physical regions drawn from those provinces.

#	Place	Why it's here
1	The Northeast Northeastern United States	Census region of nine states in two divisions, New England and the Middle Atlantic. The smallest region by area
2	The Midwest Midwestern United States	Census region of 12 states in two divisions, East North Central and West North Central, from Ohio to the Dakotas
3	The South Southern United States	Census region of 16 states and D.C. in three divisions, from Delaware to Texas. The most populous region
4	The West Western United States	Census region of 13 states in the Mountain and Pacific divisions, Alaska and Hawaii included. The largest by area
5	Appalachia Appalachia	Mountain cultural region of the eastern interior, officially 423 counties in 13 states from New York to Mississippi
6	New England New England	The six states from Maine to Connecticut, a cultural region that is also a formal Census division
7	The Deep South Deep South United States	The old cotton core of the South, usually Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina
8	The Mid-Atlantic Mid-Atlantic United States	The dense seaboard corridor from New York to Washington, D.C., wider in common use than the three-state Census division
9	The Pacific Northwest Pacific Northwest	The wet, forested corner of Washington, Oregon and Idaho, often stretched to include British Columbia
10	The Rust Belt Rust Belt United States	Deindustrialized manufacturing belt from New York to Wisconsin, centered on the Great Lakes
11	The Southwest Southwestern United States	The arid borderlands of Arizona, New Mexico and neighbors, shaped by Native, Hispanic and Anglo cultures
12	The Sun Belt Sun Belt United States	The warm southern tier from the Carolinas to California, the center of U.S. population growth since the 1970s
13	The Atlantic Coastal Plain Atlantic Coastal Plain	Flat, low sediment plain along the Atlantic from Cape Cod to Florida, continuing west as the Gulf Coastal Plain
14	The Basin and Range Basin and Range Province	Stretched crust of parallel mountain ranges and desert basins, from southern Oregon to Mexico, centered on Nevada
15	The Great Plains Great Plains	Broad, semi-arid grassland sloping east from the foot of the Rocky Mountains, from Canada to Texas
16	The Mississippi Valley Mississippi Alluvial Plain	The wide alluvial plain of the lower Mississippi, from southern Illinois to the Gulf of Mexico
17	The Piedmont The Piedmont	Rolling upland between the Appalachians and the Coastal Plain, ending at the Fall Line of rapids and mill towns

Formal, functional and perceptual regions

New England is a good formal region, a fixed set of six states that the Census also uses as a division. The Corn Belt is formal too, defined by what farmers plant. The New York metropolitan area is functional, held together by commuters, rail lines and one regional economy that crosses three states. The Rust Belt, the Sun Belt and the Bible Belt are perceptual. Nobody agrees on their exact borders, but most Americans could point to them on a map, and the labels carry ideas about jobs, climate and religion.

The four Census regions and nine divisions

The Northeast has two divisions, New England and the Middle Atlantic (New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania). The Midwest has two, East North Central and West North Central. The South has three, South Atlantic, East South Central and West South Central, and it includes Delaware, Maryland and D.C. The West has two, Mountain and Pacific, with Alaska and Hawaii in the Pacific division. The nine divisions date to the 1910 census, and the North Central region was renamed the Midwest in 1984.

Questions people ask

What is the Rust Belt?

The old heavy-industry zone around the Great Lakes, from upstate New York and Pennsylvania through Ohio, Michigan, Indiana and Illinois to Wisconsin, which lost much of its steel and auto work from the 1970s on.

Which states are in the Sun Belt?

There is no official list. Most definitions run from the Carolinas and Florida across Georgia, Alabama, Texas and the Southwest to Southern California and Nevada.

What are the four regions of the U.S.?

The Census Bureau’s Northeast, Midwest, South and West.

Is the Midwest a formal or perceptual region?

Both. The Census Midwest is a formal region of exactly 12 states. The Midwest people imagine, of farms, small towns and a certain accent, is perceptual, and its edges blur into Pennsylvania, Kentucky and Oklahoma.

Each place links to its full entry, with key facts, a map and sources. Browse all guides or open the explore map.