Largest River Basins of Africa on a Map - Hard

Try to name the African rivers with the largest drainage basin area.
Sources and remarks on methodology can be found in the comments
Quiz by
Nathaniel
Rate:
Last updated: November 12, 2025
You have not attempted this quiz yet.
First submittedNovember 12, 2025
Times taken64
Average score30.0%
Report this quizReport
10:00
Enter river here
0
 / 40 guessed
The quiz is paused. You have remaining.
Scoring
You scored / = %
This beats or equals % of test takers also scored 100%
The average score is
Your high score is
Your fastest time is
Keep scrolling down for answers and more stats ...
 
km²
River Basin
3.7 mil
Congo
3.3 mil
Nile
2.3 mil
Niger
1.3 mil
Zambezi
941 k
Orange
549 k
Chari
498 k
Jubba
421 k
Limpopo
420 k
Senegal
407 k
Volta
358 k
Okavango
337 k
Shebelle
204 k
Rufiji
224 k
Ogooué
183 k
Yobe
156 k
Ruvuma
150 k
Cuanza
140 k
Sanaga
126 k
Tana
115 k
Draa
km²
River Basin
113 k
Okwa
110 k
Awash
107 k
Cunene
106 k
Save
99.7 k
Bandama
95.0 k
Saoura
86.7 k
Omo
78.0 k
Komoé
77.1 k
Gambia
74.5 k
Sassandra
70.0 k
Nugaal
68.6 k
Ekuma
65.0 k
Saguia el-Hamra
66.2 k
Barka
61.7 k
Kouilou-Niari
60.8 k
Lúrio
55.8 k
Mangoky
54.0 k
Cross
54.0 k
Moulouya
51.0 k
Batha
Save Your Stats
Your Next Quiz
Try to name the countries that have exported the most weapons in the last 10 years.
20 random countries have been removed from the map of the world! Can you identify them in 3 minutes?
Drag the pin onto the correct country. Careful, though! Three wrong moves and the game ends.
Among these first names, click the ones where the average person in the U.S. with that name is at least 50 years old.
5 Comments
+1
Level 77
Nov 12, 2025
Main sources:

Fabrice, P. et al. (2022). Water Resources in Africa under Global Change: Monitoring Surface Waters from Space. In: Surveys in Geophysics. https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Location-of-river-basins-and-lakes-in-Africa_fig1_360066264. Retrieved: 12.11.2025.

Seznam.cz. (n. d.). Mapy.com. https://mapy.com/de/. Retrieved: 12.11.2025.

Unknown Reddit user. (2018). Africa river basins. In: r/MapPorn. https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/bx0plr/africa_river_basins/. Retrieved: 12.11.2025.

+1
Level 77
Nov 12, 2025
Rivers are more complicated than you might imagine. It was very hard to find information let alone exhaustive lists of river basin sizes. The one on Wikipedia is deeply flawed and lacking many lesser-known rivers especially endorheic ones. Furthermore, information on basin sizes of wadis is almost impossible to find, hence no wadis are included. But do wadis even have a drainage basin in the conventional sense? Albeit the name implies it being a wadi, the Oued Saoura is included, since it doesn’t dry up in most years. Rivers, where sections usually dry up are included. The beforementioned list also does not discriminate between rivers in endorheic basins properly.
+1
Level 77
Nov 12, 2025
A few notes:

The Cuvelai is merely a tributary of the Ekuma, and still ‘Cuvelai-Etosha Basin’ is the name commonly used. I got a map of the river and its tributaries, did a bit of guessing and approximated the basin of the Ekuma and calculated the area from the map.

The Shebelle does not reach the Jubba in most years and is thus falsely combined with it in most data.

The Niger basin is shrinking over time, with many of its northern tributaries drying up and not reaching the main stem, so it is becoming hard to say which numbers and which maps are correct.

Lastly, obviously not all watersheds are depicted due to the large number of endorheic basins, wadis and rivers that dry up along the way (all mostly in the Sahara).

+2
Level 85
Nov 12, 2025
accept Comoe for Komoe? great quiz btw
+1
Level 77
Nov 12, 2025
Done, sorry I forgot to do that right away. Thank you!