CardiaThe first of the four regions. The other three are the fundus, the body and the pylorus.
FundusIt sits just under the diaphragm, above and to the left of the cardia. The drawing faces you, so the body's left is on your right.
Body of the stomachThe main part of the organ. Empty, the whole stomach is about the size of a fist. Full, it holds up to 4 liters of food and drink.
Pyloric antrumThe pylorus is shaped like a funnel, and this is its wide end. The pylorus holds about 30 mL of chyme, the mix of food and gastric juice, at a time.
Pyloric canalThe narrow end of the pylorus, and the last stretch of the stomach. It connects to the duodenum.
Lesser curvatureThe concave medial border. A fold of peritoneum called the lesser omentum runs from the liver to this border and suspends the stomach.
Greater curvatureThe convex lateral border. The greater omentum starts here and lies over the intestines like an apron.
Way in and way out 4
Esophagus (food pipe)About 25 cm (10 inches) long. It runs behind the windpipe and passes through the diaphragm just before it reaches the stomach.
Lower esophageal sphincter (cardiac sphincter)It relaxes to let food into the stomach, then tightens to keep stomach acid from backing up. It is also called the gastroesophageal sphincter or the cardiac sphincter.
Pyloric sphincterIt controls how fast the stomach empties. About 3 mL of chyme passes through it at a time.
Duodenum (start of the small intestine)The first part of the small intestine. A meal does not arrive all at once: the stomach takes 2 to 4 hours to empty after eating.
Layers of the wall 5
Rugae (folds of the lining)When the stomach is empty, the two inner layers of its wall, the mucosa and the submucosa, fall into these large folds. One fold is a ruga.
Oblique muscle layer (innermost)Most of the digestive canal has two muscle layers. The stomach adds this third one, the innermost, which lets it churn food vigorously.
Circular muscle layer (middle)The middle layer of the stomach's muscularis. In the rest of the canal, which has only two layers, the circular one is the inner layer.
Longitudinal muscle layer (outermost)The outermost of the three muscle layers. The muscle of the wall makes mixing waves, about one every 20 seconds, which blend food with gastric juice.
Serosa (outer covering)The outermost of the four layers of the wall: mucosa, submucosa, muscularis, serosa. It is the visceral peritoneum. The esophagus has a sheath of collagen fibers, the adventitia, in its place.
How this list was compiled: The list of 16 parts is our own. Names, numbers and locations: OpenStax Anatomy and Physiology 2e, sections 23.4 The Stomach, 23.3 (esophagus and lower esophageal sphincter) and 23.1 (layers of the wall), https://openstax.org/books/anatomy-and-physiology-2e/pages/23-4-the-stomach, read 2026-09-19, CC BY 4.0. The everyday names gullet and food pipe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esophagus and Fig. 9.1 of Curiosity, Grade 7, https://ncert.nic.in/textbook/pdf/gecu109.pdf, both read 2026-09-20. Word origins: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pylorus, https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ruga and https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fundus, read 2026-09-19. The wording of every line is our own. Every name was checked again on 2026-09-30 against the same OpenStax sections and a second source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stomach, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pylorus and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gastric_folds, with Kenhub, Stomach (https://www.kenhub.com/en/library/anatomy/the-stomach) and TeachMeAnatomy, The Stomach (https://teachmeanatomy.info/abdomen/gi-tract/stomach/). Licence: own work
The drawing: Drawn for this site on 2026-10-05 by script. The outline, the folds of the lining and the run of the three muscle layers were laid out by eye after four public domain plates of Henry Gray, Anatomy of the Human Body (20th US edition, 1918), drawn by Henry Vandyke Carter: fig. 1046, outline of the stomach (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gray1046.svg); fig. 1050, interior of the stomach (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gray1050.png); figs. 1051 and 1052, the muscular coats (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gray1051.png and https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gray1052.png). Nothing is traced. A plan, not to scale: the folds of the lining are simplified. Licence: own work
How it works
The stomach is drawn from the front with part of its front wall open, so the folds of the lining and the muscle layers show. The body's left is on the right of the drawing, so the fundus is on your right.
Read the full guide
From the esophagus to the duodenum
Numbers 1 to 9 follow a swallow: esophagus, lower esophageal sphincter, cardia, fundus, body, pyloric antrum, pyloric canal, pyloric sphincter, duodenum. Numbers 10 and 11 are the lesser and greater curvatures. Numbers 12 to 16 cross the wall from the inside out: rugae, the oblique, circular and longitudinal muscle layers, then the serosa.
Pylorus comes from the Greek for gatekeeper: its sphincter lets food out of the stomach a little at a time.
Ruga is Latin for a wrinkle. One ruga, many rugae.
Fundus is Latin for bottom, but in the stomach it is the dome at the top.
Questions and answers
What are the four regions of the stomach?
The cardia, the fundus, the body and the pylorus. The pylorus is a funnel, and this quiz asks its two ends as separate parts: the wide pyloric antrum, which joins the body, and the narrow pyloric canal, which joins the duodenum.
What are the three muscle layers of the stomach?
From the outside in: longitudinal, circular and oblique. Most of the digestive canal has only the first two. The stomach adds the oblique layer, which lets it churn food vigorously.
How big is the stomach?
Empty, it is about the size of a fist. Full, it holds up to 4 liters, over 75 times its empty volume.
Is there a blank stomach diagram to print?
Yes. Print blank gives the drawing with rings numbered 1 to 16 and an answer line for each. The labeled print fills the names in.
Can I practice for the art-labeling activity: gross anatomy of the stomach?
For the names, yes. Homework that says label the following anatomical features of the stomach uses a publisher's figure. This is our own drawing, so the numbers differ and it is no answer key, but the regions, curvatures, sphincters and layers keep their textbook names.