North America is located in the northern and western hemisphere of the globe.  It stretches longitudinally from approximately one hundred-seventy degrees west to ten degrees west, and almost spans from the north pole to the equator in terms of latitude reaching from north of eighty degrees north down to five degrees north.

The westernmost boundary of North America is the Bering Strait and the Bering Sea that separates the continent from Asia at their closest points, with the massive Pacific Ocean forming the majority of North America's western boundary.  In the east, the waters between Greenland and Iceland form the boundary between North America and Europe at their closest points.  The Atlantic Ocean serves as the continent's eastern border.  To the south, the Isthmus of Panama divides North and South America, where the political border between Panama and Colombia stands as the only place where the continent shares a border with another continent.  The Caribbean Sea also separates the many islands of the eastern part of North America from South America.