Pacific Ocean

American

[puh-sif-ik oh-shuhn] / pəˈsɪf ɪk ˈoʊ ʃən /

Often the Pacific

noun

the largest of the world’s five principal oceans, bordered by the American continents, Asia, and Australia, with its deepest section in the Mariana Trench: divided by the equator into the North Pacific Ocean and the South Pacific Ocean. 62,455,900 square miles (161,760,000 square kilometers).

Pacific Ocean British

noun

the world's largest and deepest ocean, lying between Asia and Australia and North and South America: almost landlocked in the north, linked with the Arctic Ocean only by the Bering Strait, and extending to Antarctica in the south; has exceptionally deep trenches, and a large number of volcanic and coral islands. Area: about 165 760 000 sq km (64 000 000 sq miles). Average depth: 4215 m (14 050 ft). Greatest depth: Challenger Deep (in the Marianas Trench), 11 033 m (37 073 ft). Greatest width: (between Panama and Mindanao, Philippines) 17 066 km (10 600 miles)

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Pacific Ocean Cultural

The largest ocean in the world, separating Asia and Australia on the west from North America and South America on the east.

Etymology

Origin of Pacific Ocean

First recorded in 1560–70

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

La Nina is a naturally occurring climate phenomenon that cools surface temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean.

From Barron's

La Nina cools the eastern Pacific Ocean for a period of about one to three years, generating the opposite effects to El Nino on global weather.

From Barron's

They will end the mission with a splash down in the Pacific Ocean.

From BBC

Conuma’s production pause cascaded far beyond eastern British Columbia as it halted a railroad line, stalled activity at a Pacific Ocean port and complicated steelmaking schedules in Asia.

From The Wall Street Journal

From Russia’s war in Ukraine to the Pacific Ocean, balloons are making a comeback, boosted by high-tech innovations in sensors, autonomy and materials.

From The Wall Street Journal

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023