Río de la Plata Basin

Río de la Plata Basin
Platine Region
The southern Platine region viewed from space, with the Río de la Plata at the lower-right
Map of the Río de la Plata basin in South America, with major cities and rivers marked
Location	South America
Coordinates	32°15′S 59°30′W / 32.250°S 59.500°W / -32.250; -59.500Coordinates: 32°15′S 59°30′W / 32.250°S 59.500°W / -32.250; -59.500
Area	3,170,000 square kilometres (1,220,000 sq mi)
Major rivers	Río de la Plata, Paraná River, Uruguay River, Paraguay River

The Río de la Plata basin (Spanish: Cuenca del Plata, Portuguese: Bacia do Prata), sometimes called the Platine basin or Platine region, is the 3,170,000-square-kilometre (1,220,000 sq mi) hydrographical area in South America that drains to the Río de la Plata. It includes areas of southeastern Bolivia, southern and central Brazil, the entire country of Paraguay, most of Uruguay, and northern Argentina. Making up about one fourth of the continent's surface, it is the second largest drainage basin in South America (after the Amazon basin) and one of the largest in the world.

The main rivers of the La Plata basin are the Paraná River, the Paraguay River (the Paraná's main tributary), and the Uruguay River.

The La Plata basin is bounded by the Brazilian Highlands to the north, the Andes Mountains to the west, and Patagonia to the south. The watershed extends mostly northward from the source of the Río de la Plata for roughly 2,400 kilometres (1,500 mi), as far as Brasília and Cuiabá in Brazil and Sucre in Bolivia, spanning latitudes between 14 and 27 degrees south and longitudes between 43 and 67 degrees west. The Paraná River, La Plata's largest tributary, is South America's second longest river and one of the longest in the world..