Thirteen original states formed the United States after declaring independence in 1776.
Before independence, these communities were Britain’s Thirteen Colonies along the Atlantic coast of North America. Their names were New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.
The colonies did not all have identical governments or economies. New England included major maritime communities, the Middle Colonies were ethnically and religiously diverse, and the Southern Colonies relied heavily on plantation agriculture and enslaved labor.
The thirteen states were represented in the Continental Congress and later under the Articles of Confederation. The United States expanded beyond them when Vermont joined in 1791, followed by Kentucky and Tennessee in the 1790s.