Which African desert is the largest hot desert in the world?

The Sahara Desert is the largest hot desert in the world.

The Sahara stretches across much of North Africa, from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea. It covers approximately 9.2 million square kilometers, although its boundaries shift with definitions of desert climate and vegetation. The desert extends across all or parts of countries including Algeria, Chad, Egypt, Libya, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Niger, Sudan, and Tunisia.

The Sahara is not uniformly covered by sand. It includes gravel plains, rocky plateaus, mountains, salt flats, and sand seas called ergs. The highest point is Emi Koussi, a volcanic mountain in Chad’s Tibesti Range, while the desert also contains oases supported by groundwater or seasonal water sources.

The Sahara is the world’s largest hot desert, but Antarctica is larger overall and is classified as a polar desert. The Gobi is another major desert, yet it is generally described as a cold desert spanning parts of Mongolia and China. Climate shifts have repeatedly expanded and contracted the Sahara over geological time.