The Nile is Africa’s longest river, flowing about 6,650 kilometres to the Mediterranean Sea.
The river runs generally northward through northeastern Africa and reaches the sea in Egypt’s broad Nile Delta. Its two principal tributaries are the White Nile and the Blue Nile. The White Nile rises in the Great Lakes region, while the Blue Nile begins at Lake Tana in Ethiopia and supplies much of the river’s seasonal floodwater.
For thousands of years, the Nile’s flooding supported agriculture and helped ancient Egyptian civilization develop. The Aswan High Dam, completed in 1970, greatly reduced natural flooding while creating Lake Nasser and providing hydroelectric power.
The Nile is sometimes compared with the Amazon in debates about the world’s longest river, because measurements depend on how sources and river mouths are defined. In Africa, however, the Nile is conventionally recognized as the longest river.