How this list was compiled: Items made on 2026-10-01; ids and points are Natural Earth's. THE DRAWING DOES NOT SHOW ALL 23 PROVINCES ONE BY ONE: Natural Earth has the 22 regions of 2008 to 2012 and Chad has 23 provinces today. The page numbers and asks the 17 shapes that are provinces of today (16 provinces and the city of N'Djamena, which ranks as a province). Two more shapes are in this file for the drawing and are never asked. The first is the north, one area that holds four provinces, Borkou, Ennedi-Est, Ennedi-Ouest and Tibesti (one region, Borkou-Ennedi-Tibesti, until 2008): Ennedi has been two provinces since 2012 and the source has no line between them, and the source's lines around Borkou do not agree with the United Nations humanitarian office's boundary set for Chad (https://data.humdata.org/dataset/cod-ab-tcd, source Chad's national statistics institute INSEED; boundaries of September 2012; reviewed 30 October 2025), which gives Tibesti 214,187 square km where the source draws 120,214. The second is Ouaddaï and Sila drawn as one area, because the texts read disagree on which departments belong to which of the two today and 35 percent of the United Nations set's Ouaddaï lies in the source's Sila. Laid over the United Nations set on 2026-10-01, each of the 17 numbered shapes is 86 to 98 percent the land of the province of the same name, and each of the two areas 94 to 100 percent the land of the provinces it holds. Count and every name read on 2026-10-01 in ISO 3166-2:TD as Wikipedia prints it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-2:TD: 23 provinces; Ennedi-Est and Ennedi-Ouest added and Ennedi deleted on 2014-11-03; category changed from region to province on 2020-11-24), in the table at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provinces_of_Chad (23 provinces; Ennedi divided in 2012; Ordinance No. 038/PR/2018 of 10 August 2018; the 2008 division of Borkou-Ennedi-Tibesti) and in the United Nations set (Admin 1, 23 provinces). Hadjer Lamis is written without a hyphen, as ISO 3166-2 and the United Nations set write it; the hyphen is Wikipedia's spelling and counts as the same typed answer. N'Djamena carries its mark on its own point, without the ring of the points file, because the page opens on a plain outline. Guéra does not accept the source's alternative name Baguirmi, which belongs to another province. Licence: public domain (Natural Earth terms of use: https://www.naturalearthdata.com/about/terms-of-use/)
The drawing: Drawn for this site from Natural Earth 5.1.2, ne_10m_admin_1_states_provinces (scale 1:10,000,000), https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvkelso/natural-earth-vector/v5.1.2/geojson/ne_10m_admin_1_states_provinces.geojson, downloaded 2026-09-19. Surrounding land from Natural Earth 5.1.2, ne_10m_admin_0_countries (scale 1:10,000,000), https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvkelso/natural-earth-vector/v5.1.2/geojson/ne_10m_admin_0_countries.geojson, downloaded 2026-09-19. Layers that cannot be tapped from Natural Earth 5.1.2, ne_10m_rivers_lake_centerlines (scale 1:10,000,000), https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvkelso/natural-earth-vector/v5.1.2/geojson/ne_10m_rivers_lake_centerlines.geojson, downloaded 2026-09-19. Lambert azimuthal equal-area projection centred on 12.1°N 18°E. Outlines simplified; small islands are left out. Licence: public domain (Natural Earth terms of use: https://www.naturalearthdata.com/about/terms-of-use/)
How it works
This blank map of Chad opens on the plain outline, with six neighbors as plain land. Switches add two rivers and province borders. The map source is older than today's list, so 17 of the 23 provinces carry a number.
Read the full guide
Outline first
The sheet opens with nothing inside the outline. Press Print this map for a sheet to draw the desert, Lake Chad, towns or the 23 provinces on. Rivers adds the Chari and the Logone, and Borders adds the province lines.
Why seventeen provinces have numbers
Numbered and Named label seventeen of the 23 provinces. Two areas have no number. The north holds four provinces: Borkou, Ennedi-Est, Ennedi-Ouest and Tibesti. An area on the border with Sudan holds two, Ouaddaï and Sila. The map source has no sure line inside either area, so none is drawn.
A river is drawn as thin as a province line, so switch on Rivers or Borders, one at a time.
Questions and answers
How many provinces does Chad have?
Twenty-three, since Ennedi was split in 2012 into Ennedi-Est and Ennedi-Ouest. They were called regions until 2018. This map numbers seventeen of them.
Why do two areas have no number?
Each holds more than one province. The north holds Borkou, Ennedi-Est, Ennedi-Ouest and Tibesti, which were one region until 2008. The area on the border with Sudan holds Ouaddaï and Sila. The map source has no sure line inside either.
What is the capital of Chad?
N'Djamena, the largest city. It ranks as a province of its own, a very small shape on the border with Cameroon in the southwest.
Which countries border Chad?
Libya to the north, Sudan to the east, the Central African Republic to the south, Cameroon and Nigeria to the southwest and Niger to the west. Chad has no coast.