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Coastline and Shoreline

Shoreline and Coastline are different concepts:

• Coastline follows the general line of the coast, but sometimes, in the case of small inlets or bays, the coastline is measured as running directly across the bay or inlet to rejoin the coastline on the opposite side. Coastline is not measured as precisely as is shoreline.
• Shoreline is the perimeter of the land along the water's edge, measured to the closest exactness possible. Shoreline is, therefore, usually longer for a particular location than is its coastline.

Canada has the longest coastline of any country in the world. The coastline includes the mainland coast and also the coasts of offshore islands. The total length of Canada's coastline is 243 042 kilometres.

List of Coastline Facts:

• Coastline by Province and Territory (in kilometres)
• Great Lakes Shorelines (in kilometres)

Criteria Employed in Measuring the Coastline

The Canadian Hydrographic Service has measured the coastlines and islands of Canada, using National Topographic System maps at the scale of 1:250 000. To differentiate between the coastline and the shoreline at the mouths of rivers and streams, the mouths were closed off with arbitrary closing lines. These closing lines were not included in coastline measurements. For rivers such as the Mackenzie River and Fraser River having deltas at their mouths, closing lines joined the seaward points of the outermost islands of the delta. Bodies of water contained by bays, fiords, inlets, sounds or straits were considered part of the open sea, and the adjacent coastlines were included in the total length of coastline. In northern regions, glacier edges, as depicted on the maps, were assumed to be coincidental with the mean sea level contour and the seaward edges of glaciers were included in coastline measurements.

* Main island only
** Includes perimeter of Cape Breton Island