About 97% of Earth’s water is found in the oceans as salty seawater.

Quick Scoop

  • About 71% of Earth’s surface is covered by water, and almost all of that total water—around 97%—is in the world’s oceans as salt water.
  • The remaining ~3% is freshwater, mostly locked up in glaciers and ice caps, stored underground as groundwater, or in rivers, lakes, and the atmosphere.

Why this matters

  • Ocean water is too salty to drink or to use directly for most crops and industry, so humans rely on the tiny fraction of freshwater instead.
  • Because only a very small slice of Earth’s total water is easily accessible freshwater, protecting rivers, lakes, and groundwater is especially important for future water security.

In short: when people say “97% of Earth’s water,” they’re talking about the vast salty oceans surrounding every continent.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.