- The Amazon is the world's biggest rainforest, larger than the next two largest rainforests — in the Congo Basin and Indonesia — combined.
- At 6.9 million square kilometers (2.72 million square miles), the Amazon Basin is roughly the size of the forty-eight contiguous United States and covers some 40 percent of the South American continent. The "Amazon rainforest" — which defined biogeographically includes the rainforest in the Guianas, which technically are outside the Amazon Basin — covers 7.8-8.2 million square km (3-3.2 million square mi), of which just over 80 percent is forested.
- The Amazon River is by far the world's largest river by volume. It has over 1,100 tributaries, 17 of which are longer than 1000 miles.
- The Amazon River once flowed west-ward instead of east-ward as it does today. The rise of the Andes caused it to flow into the Atlantic Ocean.
- The Amazon is estimated to have 16,000 tree species and 390 billion individual trees
- Nearly two-thirds of the Amazon rainforest is found in Brazil.
- The Amazon is thought to have 2.5 million species of insects. More than half the species in the Amazon rainforest are thought to live in the canopy.
- 70 percent of South America's GDP is produced in areas that receive rainfall or water from the Amazon. The Amazon influences rainfall patterns as far away as the United States.
- Cattle ranching accounts for roughly 70 percent of deforestation in the Amazon.
- Deforestation in the Amazon rainforest has been declining since 2004, mostly due to the falling deforestation rate in Brazil. There are a variety of reasons for the decline, including macroeconomic trends, new protected areas and indigenous territories, improved law enforcement, deforestation monitoring via satellite, pressure from environmental groups, and private sector initiatives.
