UT · Beehive State · West · admitted 1896 (#45)
Utah map
Utah highlighted on the US map, with Salt Lake City as both capital and largest city at the foot of the Wasatch Range. Its notched outline is made entirely of surveyed lines.
- Capital
- Salt Lake City
- Largest city
- Salt Lake City
- Population (2020)
- 3,271,616
- Area
- 84,897 sq mi
- Counties
- 29
- Time zone
- Mountain
- Region
- West · Mountain
- Statehood
- January 4, 1896
Where Utah is
Utah is the state shaped like a rectangle with its northeast corner cut out, in the Mountain West between the Great Basin and the Rockies. It measures about 350 miles north to south and about 270 miles east to west. Clockwise from the north: Idaho along the 42nd parallel, Wyoming filling the notch in the northeast, Colorado along a meridian to the east, Arizona along the 37th parallel to the south, and Nevada along a meridian to the west, with New Mexico touching at Four Corners. It is the 13th-largest state by area and 30th by population.
Major cities
| City | Region of state | Population (2020) |
|---|---|---|
| Salt Lake City (capital) | Wasatch Front, north | 199,723 |
| West Valley City | Salt Lake Valley | 140,230 |
| West Jordan | Salt Lake Valley | 116,961 |
| Provo | Utah Valley, Wasatch Front | 115,162 |
| Orem | Utah Valley, Wasatch Front | 98,129 |
| St. George | Southwest corner, Dixie | 95,342 |
About 80 percent of Utahns live on the Wasatch Front, the 80-mile strip from Ogden through Salt Lake City to Provo between the mountains and the Great Salt Lake and Utah Lake. St. George is the only large city outside it.
Geography
- Highest point — Kings Peak, 13,528 ft, in the Uinta Mountains, one of the few major east–west ranges in the US. The Wasatch Range runs north–south along the Front.
- Great Salt Lake — the largest saltwater lake in the Western Hemisphere, a remnant of ice-age Lake Bonneville; the Bonneville Salt Flats lie to its west. See the lakes map.
- Great Basin — the western third of the state drains inward; the Bear, Weber, Provo and Jordan rivers all end in the Great Salt Lake or Utah Lake.
- Colorado Plateau — the southeastern half, cut by the Colorado and Green rivers into canyon country: Canyonlands, Arches, Capitol Reef, Bryce Canyon and Zion, Utah's five national parks. See the Colorado Plateau map and the Colorado River map.
- Lake Powell — the reservoir behind Glen Canyon Dam, mostly in Utah on the Arizona line.
- Lowest point — Beaver Dam Wash, about 2,200 ft, in the southwest corner where the Mojave Desert edges into the state.
Borders
Utah has no natural borders at all. The 42nd parallel (Idaho), the 37th parallel (Arizona), the 32nd meridian west of Washington (Colorado, about 109°03'W) and the 37th meridian west of Washington (Nevada, about 114°03'W) form the rectangle, and Wyoming's southwestern corner is cut from it along the 41st parallel and 111°03'W. Because the 19th-century surveys were imperfect, the lines have small kinks; the Colorado border, for instance, is not perfectly straight. Four Corners, where Utah meets Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona, is the only point in the US shared by four states.
Regions of Utah
The Wasatch Front (Ogden, Salt Lake City, Provo), the Wasatch Back (Park City, Heber), Northern Utah and Cache Valley (Logan), the West Desert, Central Utah along the Sevier River, the Uinta Basin (Vernal) in the northeast, Canyon Country in the southeast (Moab, San Juan County) and Dixie in the southwest (St. George, Cedar City).
Related maps
- Utah county map — all 29 counties with seats.
- Blank Utah map — outline for printing.
- Printable Utah map.
- Salt Lake City — the capital and largest city, founded 1847.
- Neighbors: Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico.
- West, Mountain division, Rocky Mountains, Mountain Time Zone.
- Geography: Four Corners, Colorado Plateau, national parks.