Mekong

American  

[mey-kong, ma-kohng] / ˈmeɪˈkɒŋ, mæˈkoʊŋ /

noun

1. a river whose source is in SW China, flowing SE along most of the boundary between Thailand and Laos to the South China Sea. 2,600 miles (4,200 km) long.

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Mekong British  

/ ˌmiːˈkɒŋ /

noun

1. a river in SE Asia, rising in SW China in Qinghai province: flows southeast forming the border between Laos and Myanmar, and part of the border between Laos and Thailand, then continues south across Cambodia and Vietnam to the South China Sea by an extensive delta, one of the greatest rice-growing areas in Asia. Length: about 4025 km (2500 miles)

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Example Sentences

Several major deltas are experiencing especially rapid elevation loss, including those of the Mekong, Nile, Chao Phraya, Ganges-Brahmaputra, Mississippi, and Yellow rivers.

From Science Daily • Apr. 20, 2026

Instead, the 30-year-old French citizen found himself among more than 140 people, mostly tourists, on a ferry that capsized in the Mekong River.

From BBC • Dec. 22, 2025

A year after that first meeting, in 2003, Johnson and Sothea founded Sovann Komar, which means “Golden Children” in Khmer, a gilded home for children on the banks of the Mekong River.

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 8, 2025

That means they are also imperiling some of the world’s most important food-producing lowlands in the Nile and Mekong deltas and cities from Shanghai to New York.

From Salon • Jul. 28, 2025

In December, Meng tells me we will relocate to Long Deang to live on a houseboat with one of Eang’s sisters and her family in the lower end of the Mekong Delta.

From "First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers" by Loung Ung