New Orleans Map
New Orleans occupies a crescent of made and natural high ground on the Mississippi about 100 river miles above the Gulf, with Lake Pontchartrain at its back.
Where is New Orleans?
New Orleans lies in southeastern Louisiana, in the delta country where the Mississippi swings east before turning south to the sea. The city is boxed in: the river on one side, Lake Pontchartrain on the other, swamp and open water beyond both. Baton Rouge, the state capital, is about 80 miles upriver to the northwest. Houston is roughly 350 miles west along the coast, Memphis some 395 miles north up the river, and Atlanta about 470 miles northeast. Mobile, the nearest port of any size to the east, is around 145 miles away.
New Orleans at a glance
| State | Louisiana |
| Parish | Orleans Parish |
| Population (2024 estimate) | 362,701 |
| Rank among US cities | 54th of the 100 largest |
| Time zone | Central Time |
| Region | South — West South Central division |
New Orleans in Louisiana
Louisiana divides into parishes rather than counties, and New Orleans is exactly coterminous with Orleans Parish — the city has no unincorporated remainder and no suburbs of its own, which is why its population figure looks small next to a metro area of well over a million. Jefferson Parish to the west and St. Bernard to the east hold much of the rest; the Louisiana parish map shows all 64. It is the only Louisiana city among the country's hundred largest, and the Louisiana state page covers how the state's population sits along the river and the coast.
River, lake and levee
The oldest parts of the city sit on the natural levee — the low ridge of silt the Mississippi built along its own banks over thousands of years, and the only ground here that was ever naturally dry. The French Quarter is on it, a few feet above sea level. Everything built later spread back into the drained backswamp toward Lake Pontchartrain, and much of that ground is below sea level and sinking as the peat beneath it dries and compacts. The whole city depends on levees and pumps, a system whose failure during Hurricane Katrina in 2005 flooded most of it. Lake Pontchartrain is not really a lake but a brackish estuary open to the Gulf, crossed by a causeway close to 24 miles long. Downstream the river runs another 100 miles through the delta to the Gulf coast.
Cities near New Orleans
The nearest large cities are Houston west, Memphis north and Atlanta northeast, with Jacksonville and Tampa further around the Gulf and Atlantic coasts. The South region page puts Louisiana beside the other states that share the Gulf and the lower Mississippi.