For starters, our 4479-square-mile Chesapeake is eight times larger than the 550-square-mile San Francisco Bay.
To put it in perspective, it's roughly the size of the Virginia portion of the Chesapeake River, from the south coast of the Potomac and Pocomoke Sound to the Chesapeake Bay bridge-tunnel.
Many sources describe Chesapeake Bay as the third largest estuary in the world. Others consider it the second largest. We've even seen it described (incorrectly) as the largest estuary in the world.It has also been described as the largest estuary in the United States. The San Francisco Estuary, including its historic wetlands, covers an area of more than 1,900 square miles (Figure). The Salish Sea estuary, comprised of Puget Sound, Juan de Fuca Strait, Strait of Georgia, and Desolation Strait, covers 7,200 square miles, nearly four times bigger. It is the largest on the West Coast and is even larger than the Chesapeake Bay estuary.
This is a list of bays in the United States. A dozen rivers flow into the bay to create one of the largest brackish water bays on the planet, creating a diverse habitat comprised of tidal pools, swamps and rivers. The “classic” definition of an estuary used by the EPA dates back to 1952 and is attributed to an oceanographer who studied Chesapeake Bay, according to Michael Fincham in Chesapeake Quarterly. For its average depth, Puget Sound is about 230 feet, Cook Inlet is 147 feet, and Chesapeake Bay is 21 feet.
By the way, technically San Francisco Bay isn't really a bay, it's an estuary formed by the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers. Lawrence is clearly the largest estuary in North America, with an area of 60,000 square miles (155,000 km) compared to 4,480 square miles (11,600 km) of Chesapeake Bay. I think part of this is because, at least as I understand it, San Francisco Bay is much more homogeneous than Chesapeake Bay, and the latter is also much larger. Since Chesapeake Bay doesn't fluctuate much, the figure of 4,480 square miles is a pretty good estimate during any tidal period.
We all hear people from San Francisco say they are from the “Bay Area”, but with more than three dozen bays in the United States, one wonders why only one bears this nickname. I recently discovered a podcast series from a few years ago called BayWide, which explores various topics related to the Chesapeake Bay. Explorers discovered Chesapeake as early as 1524, more than 200 years before the first accounts of explorers who discovered the San Francisco Bay.