Geography of the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Geography in Congo-Kinshasa, clockwise from the top: Lake Kivu, Kahuzi-Biéga National Park, the Congo River, Mount Mangengenge.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is the largest country of sub-Saharan Africa, occupying some 2,344,858 square kilometres (905,355 sq mi).^[1] Most of the country lies within the vast hollow of the Congo River basin.^[1] The vast, low-lying central area is a plateau-shaped basin sloping toward the west, covered by tropical rainforest and criss-crossed by rivers. The forest center is surrounded by mountainous terraces in the west, plateaus merging into savannas in the south and southwest. Dense grasslands extend beyond the Congo River in the north. High mountains of the Ruwenzori Range (some above 5,000 m or 16,000 ft) are found on the eastern borders with Rwanda and Uganda (see Albertine Rift montane forests for a description of this area).