4 regions · 9 divisions listed · landscape · Letter or A4 · colour
Printable regions US map
The four Census regions — Northeast, Midwest, South and West — shaded in four colours with a legend, ready to print on one landscape page. Press Abbreviations first if you want the states coded.
What prints
The 50 states shaded by Census region, with the legend below the map: Northeast (9 states), Midwest (12), South (16) and West (13). State borders remain visible inside each colour block. Alaska and Hawaii are both West and print in the inset boxes. Press Abbreviations before printing to add the two-letter code to each state; that is the version most teachers use, because the exercise is then to write the region name rather than identify the state. The colours are chosen to stay distinct when printed in greyscale: Northeast darkest, then South, Midwest, West lightest.
Print settings
- Press the Print button on the map (or Ctrl+P / Cmd+P). The page switches to a print layout with the map only — no header, navigation or text.
- Orientation: Landscape. The contiguous states are about 1.6 times as wide as they are tall, which matches a landscape Letter or A4 sheet almost exactly.
- Margins: Default or Minimum. Turn off Headers and footers so the URL and date do not print.
- Scale: 100%, or Fit to page if your browser offers it.
- To make a PDF instead of a paper copy, choose Save as PDF as the destination.
The one extra step for this sheet is Background graphics: on. Browsers turn page backgrounds off by default to save ink; with it off the region colours vanish and you get a plain outline map.
The regions on the sheet
| Region | Divisions | States |
|---|---|---|
| Northeast | New England, Middle Atlantic | 9 |
| Midwest | East North Central, West North Central | 12 |
| South | South Atlantic, East South Central, West South Central | 16 |
| West | Mountain, Pacific | 13 |
Exercises
- Colour it yourself. Print the blank map instead and shade the four regions by hand, then compare with this sheet. The hard calls are Delaware and Maryland (South), Kentucky (South, not Midwest) and Missouri and Kansas (Midwest, not South).
- Divisions. On the printed sheet, draw a line inside each region separating its divisions: New England from the Middle Atlantic; the Great Lakes states from the plains states; South Atlantic, East South Central and West South Central; Mountain from Pacific.
- Count and compare. Write the number of states in each region in the legend, then rank the regions by area (West, South, Midwest, Northeast) and by population (South, West, Midwest, Northeast).
- Border states. Circle the states that touch two regions — Pennsylvania, Ohio, Kentucky, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Montana and so on — and name the neighbour across the line.
Related sheets
The regions map on screen has a page for each region and division, including the informal ones (Southeast, Pacific Northwest, Great Plains). Region quizzes: Northeast, Midwest, South, West.
Blank outline map · Labeled map · Abbreviations map · Capitals worksheet · Capitals answer key · Time zones map · Major cities map · Rivers map · all printable maps