OH · Buckeye State · Midwest · admitted 1803 (#17)
Ohio map
Ohio highlighted on the US map, between Lake Erie and the Ohio River. Columbus is both the capital and the largest city, with Cleveland and Cincinnati at the state's northern and southern edges.
- Capital
- Columbus
- Largest city
- Columbus
- Population (2020)
- 11,799,448
- Area
- 44,826 sq mi
- Counties
- 88
- Time zone
- Eastern
- Region
- Midwest · East North Central
- Statehood
- March 1, 1803
Where Ohio is
Ohio is the easternmost state of the Midwest, bounded by Lake Erie on the north and the Ohio River on the south and east. It is about 220 miles from north to south and about 220 miles east to west. Clockwise from the north: Lake Erie (with the Ontario boundary in mid-lake), Pennsylvania along a meridian to the east, West Virginia and Kentucky across the Ohio River to the southeast and south, and Indiana along a meridian to the west, with Michigan along a short surveyed line in the northwest. Ohio is the seventh most populous state and 34th by area.
Major cities
| City | Region of state | Population (2020) |
|---|---|---|
| Columbus (capital) | Central | 905,748 |
| Cleveland | Northeast, on Lake Erie | 372,624 |
| Cincinnati | Southwest, on the Ohio River | 309,317 |
| Toledo | Northwest, on Lake Erie | 270,871 |
| Akron | Northeast | 190,469 |
| Dayton | Southwest, Miami Valley | 137,644 |
Columbus overtook Cleveland as the largest city in the 1990 count and passed 900,000 in 2020. The Cleveland, Cincinnati and Columbus metro areas each exceed 2 million, and the three "C"s form a triangle linked by Interstates 71, 70 and 77.
Geography
- Highest point — Campbell Hill, 1,549 ft, near Bellefontaine in the west-central part of the state; the lowest point is about 455 ft where the Ohio River leaves at the Indiana line.
- Ohio River — 451 miles of the state's southern and eastern border, from East Liverpool to Cincinnati and beyond. See the Ohio River map.
- Lake Erie — the shallowest Great Lake; Ohio's shoreline runs about 310 miles from Toledo to Conneaut, with the Lake Erie Islands off Sandusky. See the Great Lakes map.
- Interior rivers — the Scioto through Columbus, the Great Miami through Dayton, the Muskingum, the Maumee to Toledo and the Cuyahoga to Cleveland. The divide between Lake Erie and Ohio River drainage runs across the northern third of the state.
- Terrain — glaciated plains in the west and north; the unglaciated Allegheny Plateau of the Appalachian foothills in the southeast, including Hocking Hills.
Borders
The Ohio River border is fixed at the river's low-water mark on the Ohio side as of 1792, so Kentucky and West Virginia own the river itself. The Pennsylvania line is a meridian surveyed in 1786 at about 80°31'W. The Indiana border is a meridian from the Ohio River due north to Michigan. The Michigan line was disputed in the 1835 "Toledo War"; Congress gave Ohio the Toledo strip and compensated Michigan with the Upper Peninsula. In Lake Erie the international boundary runs midway to Ontario.
Regions of Ohio
Northeast Ohio (Cleveland, Akron, Youngstown, the Western Reserve), Northwest Ohio (Toledo, the flat former Great Black Swamp), Central Ohio around Columbus, Southwest Ohio (Cincinnati, Dayton, the Miami Valley), and Southeast Ohio, the hilly Appalachian counties along the river from Marietta to Portsmouth.
Related maps
- Ohio county map — all 88 counties with seats.
- Blank Ohio map — outline for printing.
- Printable Ohio map.
- Columbus — chosen as capital in 1812 for its central location.
- Neighbors: Michigan, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana.
- Midwest, East North Central division, Great Lakes, Eastern Time Zone.
- Geography: Ohio River, Great Lakes, Appalachian Mountains.