United States: List of State Abbreviations and Capitals

United States comprises 50 constituent states and one district. It is located on the North American continent. When the country gained independence from the rule of Great Britain, it had only 13 states. Between 19th and the 20th century, United States expanded across the North American continent by including 37 new states and by acquiring a number of overseas territories.

The Postal Service of United States mainly uses the abbreviations of American states. The abbreviations help to process the mail quickly with the help of automated equipment such as OCR (Optical Character Recognition). Take a glance at the states, their postal abbreviations, their capitals and the largest city in each state.

State	Capital	State Abbreviation	Largest City
Alabama	Montgomery	AL	Birmingham
Alaska	Juneau	AK	Anchorage
Arizona	Phoenix	AZ	Phoenix
Arkansas	Little Rock	AR	Little Rock
California	Sacramento	CA	Los Angeles
Colorado	Denver	CO	Denver
Connecticut	Hartford	CT	Bridgeport
Delaware	Dover	DE	Wilmington
Florida	Tallahassee	FL	Jacksonville
Georgia	Atlanta	GA	Atlanta
Hawaii	Honolulu	HI	Honolulu
Idaho	Boise	ID	Boise
Illinois	Springfield	IL	Chicago
Indiana	Indianapolis	IN	Indianapolis
Iowa	Des Moines	IA	Des Moines
Kansas	Topeka	KS	Wichita
Kentucky	Frankfort	KY	Louisville
Louisiana	Baton Rouge	LA	New Orleans
Maine	Augusta	ME	Portland
Maryland	Annapolis	MD	Baltimore
Massachusetts	Boston	MA	Boston
Michigan	Lansing	MI	Detroit
Minnesota	St. Paul	MN	Minneapolis
Mississippi	Jackson	MS	Jackson
Missouri	Jefferson City	MO	Kansas City
Montana	Helena	MT	Billings
Nebraska	Lincoln	NE	Omaha
Nevada	Carson City	NV	Las Vegas
New Hampshire	Concord	NH	Manchester
New Jersey	Trenton	NJ	Newark
New Mexico	Santa Fe	NM	Albuquerque
New York	Albany	NY	New York City
North Carolina	Raleigh	NC	Charlotte
North Dakota	Bismarck	ND	Fargo
Ohio	Columbus	OH	Columbus
Oklahoma	Oklahoma City	OK	Oklahoma City
Oregon	Salem	OR	Portland
Pennsylvania	Harrisburg	PA	Philadelphia
Rhode Island	Providence	RI	Providence
South Carolina	Columbia	SC	Columbia
South Dakota	Pierre	SD	Sioux Falls
Tennessee	Nashville	TN	Memphis
Texas	Austin	TX	Houston
Utah	Salt Lake City	UT	Salt Lake City
Vermont	Montpelier	VT	Burlington
Virginia	Richmond	VA	Virginia Beach
Washington	Olympia	WA	Seattle
West Virginia	Charleston	WV	Charleston
Wisconsin	Madison	WI	Milwaukee
Wyoming	Cheyenne	WY	Cheyenne

The capital of the United States is Washington, DC. The District of Columbia is the only federal district of the United States of America. Washington was a separate municipality within this district until 1871. Later, an Act of Congress was passed to merge the district and the city into an entity. That is how the city of Washington came to be known as Washington, DC, where DC stands for District of Columbia.