The top ten deserts in the world are the Sahara Desert, Arabian Desert, Libyan Desert, Australian Desert, Gobi Desert, Patagonian Desert, Rubhari Desert, Kalahari Desert, Great Sand Desert, and Taklamakan Desert.
1. Sahara Desert
The Sahara Desert formed about two and a half million years ago and is the second-largest desert in the world (after Antarctica) and the largest sandy desert in the world. It is located in northern Africa, and the region's climate conditions are so harsh that it is one of the most unsuitable places on earth for living creatures. Its total area is about the size of the entire continental United States.
The word "Sahara" is a transliteration of the Arabic word for "Great Desert," which is derived from the language of the local nomadic Tuareg people.
The Sahara Desert stretches across the northern part of the African continent, measuring 5,600 kilometers from east to west and 1,600 kilometers from north to south, covering a total area of 9,065,000 square kilometers, or about 32 percent of Africa's total land area. The Sahara Desert is the world's most sunny desert with the largest area.
The climatic conditions are extremely harsh and it is one of the most inhospitable places on earth for living creatures to grow. The soils of the Sahara Desert are low in organic matter and often devoid of biological activity, although nitrogen-fixing bacteria are present in some areas. The soils of the depressions are often saline.
Soils on the edge of the desert contain a higher concentration of organic matter. The Sahara is sparsely populated, with an average of less than one person per square kilometer. The population is predominantly Arab, followed by Berbers and others. The population and agricultural production are mainly located in the Nile Valley and oases, partly nomadic.
2. Arabian Desert
The Arabian Desert, with an area of 2.33 million square kilometers, is the second-largest desert in the world.
The Arabian Desert is located in the eastern part of the Sahara Desert in North Africa. It is located in the east of Egypt, between the Nile Valley, Suez Canal, and the Red Sea, also known as the Eastern Desert.
In the center, there is the Ma'aza Plateau, and on the east side, there are isolated mountains such as Mount Shaib Banat, Mount Sibay, and Mount Umnakat, and the south is connected with the Nubian Desert in Sudan.
Most of it is a gravel desert with an altitude of 300 to 1,000 meters as well as bare rocky hills. It is cut by the east-west intermittent rivers Tarfa and Hudayin and their tributaries and the north-south seasonal river Kinah.
3. Libyan Desert Editor
Located in the northeastern part of the Sahara Desert. It includes central and western Egypt and eastern Libya. The Libyan Desert is a plateau inclined from south to north, with an altitude of 350-500 meters in the south, 100-250 meters in the middle and north, and the highest terrain in the southwest, reaching 1800 meters above sea level.
There are many rocky plateaus and rocky or sandy plains in the desert, and the climate is dry and uninhabitable. The highest point is Mount Ouweinat at the junction of the three countries. The Qattara Depression in Egypt is 133 meters below sea level.
There are few inhabitants, concentrated in the Egyptian oases of Siwa, al-Bahriyah, al-Farafirah, ad-Dakhilah, al-Kharijah, and the Libyan oasis of Kufrah. The Egyptian part of the Libyan desert is called the Western Desert, which refers far more generally to the area west of Egypt.