World ranges

Mountain ranges

Twenty-two systems. Himalaya, Karakoram, Hindu Kush and Kunlun are here because UPSC treats them as world ranges. This is not an Indian drainage module.

Andes7,000 kmSouth America · Young fold · North–south, along the Pacific margin.Aconcagua, 6,961 m, Argentina. It is not a volcano. Ojos del Salado (about 6,893 m, Chile–Argentina) is the highest active volcanic complex.Trap. Longest continental mountain range — not the Himalayas. Aconcagua is in Argentina, not Chile, and is not volcanic. Do not apply the Atacama pattern to Patagonia.
Rockies4,800 kmNorth America · Young fold · North–south, inland of the Pacific coast.Mount Elbert, 4,401 m, Colorado. Denali is not in the Rockies.Trap. Denali (6,190 m) is in the Alaska Range, not the Rockies. The living volcanic arc of the US Pacific edge is the Cascades, not the Rockies.
Appalachians2,400 kmNorth America · Old fold · Northeast–southwest.Mount Mitchell, 2,037 m, North Carolina.Trap. Old fold, Paleozoic, rounded summits. Not part of the Ring of Fire and not a young seismic front.
Alps1,200 kmEurope · Young fold · East–west arc.Mont Blanc, 4,809 m, France–Italy. Exam-safe figure. Surveys cluster between about 4,805 m and 4,810 m.Trap. Mont Blanc is the highest peak of the Alps and of Western Europe. It is not the highest peak of Europe if the Caucasus is counted — that is Elbrus.
Pyrenees430 kmEurope · Young fold · East–west.Aneto, 3,404 m, Spain.Trap. Andorra is the Pyrenean microstate. The Pyrenees are not a branch of the Alps.
Carpathians1,500 kmEurope · Young fold · A hook: east from the north, then south through Romania.Gerlachovský štít, 2,655 m, High Tatras, Slovakia.Trap. Iron Gates is a breakthrough of the Danube, not its source. The source is the Black Forest.
Caucasus1,200 kmEurope · Young fold · West-northwest to east-southeast, between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea.Elbrus, 5,642 m, Russia. A dormant volcano on the European side of the Greater Caucasus.Trap. Europe’s highest peak only if the Caucasus crest is taken as Europe’s edge. Mont Blanc wins if the boundary is drawn south of Elbrus. Elbrus is not Elburz.
Urals2,500 kmEurope · Old fold · North–south.Mount Narodnaya, 1,895 m.Trap. Old fold and low, despite the north–south trend. The Ural river is inland drainage. Do not call the Urals young because they ‘separate two continents’.
Scandinavian Mountains1,700 kmEurope · Old fold · Northeast–southwest.Galdhøpiggen, 2,469 m, Norway. Exam-safe summit. Glittertind’s ice cap has been argued higher in some years; the rock summit used in exams is Galdhøpiggen.Trap. Old Caledonian fold, glacially sharpened. The wet side is the west. Do not class it with the Alps.
Atlas2,500 kmAfrica · Young fold · Southwest–northeast, folded into several chains (High, Middle, Tell, Saharan, Anti-Atlas).Toubkal, 4,167 m, High Atlas, Morocco.Trap. Atlas–Sahara is a standard rain-shadow pair. The range is young fold on Africa’s northern margin, not a relative of the Drakensberg.
Drakensberg1,000 kmAfrica · Residual escarpment · Southwest–northeast.Thabana Ntlenyana, 3,482 m, Lesotho.Trap. Not a young fold mountain. The highest point is in Lesotho, not in the Republic of South Africa’s interior provinces.
Ethiopian Highlands1,000 kmAfrica · Volcanic highland · Massif, cut by rift faults trending northeast–southwest.Ras Dashen, 4,550 m. Exam-safe textbook figure.Trap. Most Nile water and almost all Nile silt come from here via the Blue Nile and Atbara. The longer White Nile does not. The Awash is inland drainage.
Himalayas2,400 kmAsia · Young fold · Northwest–southeast arc, broadly west–east.Everest (Sagarmatha / Chomolungma), 8,848.86 m, Nepal–China. Exam-safe rounded value: 8,848 m.Trap. Everest is Nepal–China, not India. The Karakoram, and therefore K2, is not the Himalaya. The Brahmaputra flows east for a long distance in Tibet before the great bend.
Karakoram500 kmAsia · Young fold · Northwest–southeast.K2 (Godwin Austen), 8,611 m, Pakistan–China. Exam-safe figure.Trap. K2 is the world’s second-highest peak and it is not in the Himalayas.
Hindu Kush800 kmAsia · Young fold · Southwest–northeast.Tirich Mir, 7,708 m, Pakistan.Trap. Tirich Mir, not K2. The Khyber region is associated with this system, not with Everest. Helmand does not reach the sea.
Kunlun3,000 kmAsia · Young fold · East–west.Liushi Shan (Kunlun Goddess), 7,167 m. Textbooks that only need a class of height may say ‘above 7,000 m’.Trap. Northern rim of Tibet. The Himalaya is the southern rim. The Tarim does not reach an ocean.
Tian Shan2,500 kmAsia · Young fold · East–west.Jengish Chokusu (Pobeda / Tomur), 7,439 m, Kyrgyzstan–China.Trap. Syr Darya and Ili do not reach the world ocean. The Aral and Balkhash are the classic termini.
Altai2,000 kmAsia · Re-uplifted fold · Northwest–southeast.Belukha, 4,506 m, Russia.Trap. The Irtysh is longer than the Ob above their confluence, and it rises in a different country. Belukha is not an 8,000 m peak.
Zagros1,600 kmAsia · Young fold · Northwest–southeast, parallel to the Persian Gulf.Dena (Qash-Mastan), about 4,409 m. Textbooks often round the crest to about 4,400 m.Trap. Arabian–Eurasian collision, not the Indian plate. A folded oil belt. Not the Elburz, which runs east–west south of the Caspian.
Elburz (Alborz)900 kmAsia · Young fold · East–west.Damavand, 5,610 m. A volcano, and the highest peak in Iran. Exam-safe figure.Trap. Elburz is a range in Iran. Elbrus is a peak in the Caucasus. Damavand is volcanic, but the range is a fold belt.
Great Dividing Range3,500 kmOceania · Residual escarpment · North–south.Mount Kosciuszko, 2,228 m, Snowy Mountains, New South Wales. Highest peak on the Australian mainland.Trap. Kosciuszko is the Bass-list summit of Australia. Puncak Jaya, in New Guinea, is higher and is the Messner-list summit of Oceania. The Murray flows away from the nearby Pacific.
Southern Alps (New Zealand)500 kmOceania · Young fold · Northeast–southwest.Aoraki / Mount Cook, 3,724 m.Trap. The wet side is the west, because of the westerlies — the opposite of the subtropical Andes–Atacama pattern. Aoraki is not Kosciuszko.