Uttar Pradesh (UTT-ər prə-DESH, abbr. UP; Hindi: Uttar Pradēś, pronounced [ˈʊt̪ːəɾ pɾə.ˈdeːɕ] , lit. 'Northern Province') is a state in northern India. With over 241 million inhabitants, it is India's most populated state. The state is bordered by Rajasthan to the west, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Delhi to the northwest, Uttarakhand and Nepal to the north, Bihar to the east, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand to the south. It is the fourth-largest Indian state by area covering 243,286 km2 (93,933 sq mi), accounting for 7.3 per cent of the total area of India. Lucknow serves as the state capital, with Prayagraj being the judicial capital. It is divided into 18 divisions and 75 districts. Uttar Pradesh is the Indian state with the highest number of bordering states, sharing its boundaries with nine other states and one union territory.
Uttar Pradesh was established in 1950 after India had become a republic. It is a successor to the United Provinces, established in 1935 by renaming the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh, in turn established in 1902 from the North-Western Provinces and the Oudh Province. The two major rivers of the state, the Ganges and its tributary Yamuna, meet at the Triveni Sangam in Prayagraj, a Hindu pilgrimage site. Other notable rivers are Gomti and Sarayu. Most of the state is covered by the Indo Gangetic plain which is intensely farmed. The forest cover in the state is 6.1 per cent of the state's geographical area, mainly in the northern Terai. The cultivable area is 82 per cent of the total geographical area, and the net area sown is 68.5 per cent of the cultivable area.
Uttar Pradesh encompasses several distinct cultural regions, forming a continuum from Braj and Rohilkhand in the west to Bundelkhand and Awadh in the centre and Purvanchal in the east. Hindi is the official and most widely-spoken language, with Urdu as an additional official language. The region has been a major centre of political and cultural development throughout Indian history. It was the core area of several dominant Indian dynasties, including the Maurya, Gupta, Vardhana, Pala, Delhi Sultanate, and Mughal empires. During the British colonial period, the area contained several princely states, notably Rampur, Benares, and Ramgadi, and played a central role in the Indian independence movement, including the Indian Rebellion of 1857.
Though long known for sugar production, the state's economy is now dominated by the services industry. The service sector comprises travel and tourism, hotel industry, real estate, insurance and financial consultancies. The economy of Uttar Pradesh is just the third-largest state economy in India, with ₹39.8 trillion (US$410 billion) in gross domestic product and a per capita GSDP of ₹152,366 The High Court of the state is located in Prayagraj. The state plays an important role in national politics, sending 80 seats to the lower house Lok Sabha and 31 seats to the upper house Rajya Sabha. Uttar Pradesh is significant for several major world religions. It is home to many of Hinduism's most important pilgrimage sites, including Varanasi, Mathura, Ayodhya, and Prayagraj. The state is also important to Buddhism; Gautama Buddha delivered his first sermon at Sarnath near Varanasi. Several sites in the state are associated with Jainism, and Uttar Pradesh has been an important centre of Islamic culture, architecture, and learning since the medieval period. The state contains three UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
The region of present-day Uttar Pradesh has been inhabited since prehistoric times, with evidence of modern human hunter-gatherers dating to between approximately 85,000 and 72,000 years ago. Archaeological finds from the Middle and Upper Paleolithic periods (c. 31,000–21,000 years ago) have been reported, while Mesolithic or microlithic settlements, such as those at Sarai Nahar Rai in Pratapgarh, date to around 10,550–9,550 BCE and indicate subsistence patterns based on hunting, fishing, and early burial practices.
Early Stone Age remains have also been identified in the Belan Valley, where tools such as hand axes and cleavers reflect long-term habitation by hunter-gatherer communities. Neolithic sites, including Koldihwa, provide evidence of early agriculture, including rice cultivation, alongside domestication of cattle, sheep, and goats, with village settlements emerging as early as 6000 BCE and gradually developing between c. 4000 and 1500 BCE. This developmental phase overlaps with broader cultural transitions from the Indus Valley Civilisation and Harappan traditions to the Vedic period.
During the Chalcolithic phase, the use of copper alongside stone tools is reflected in the Ochre Coloured Pottery culture at sites such as Atranjikhera, along with copper hoards found across the Ganga–Yamuna Doab. The subsequent Iron Age is marked by the Painted Grey Ware culture at sites including Hastinapur and Ahichchhatra, followed by the Northern Black Polished Ware (NBPW) culture at urban centres such as Kaushambi and Varanasi, reflecting increasing urbanisation and socio-economic complexity in the region.
Out of the sixteen mahajanapadas (lit. 'great realms') or oligarchic republics that existed in ancient India, seven fell entirely within the present-day boundaries of the state. The kingdom of Kosala, in the Mahajanapada era, was also located within the regional boundaries of modern-day Uttar Pradesh. According to Hinduism, the divine King Rama of the Ramayana epic reigned in Ayodhya, the capital of Kosala.
Krishna, another divine king of Hindu legend, who plays a key role in the Mahabharata epic and is revered as the eighth reincarnation (Avatar) of the Hindu god Vishnu, is said to have been born in the city of Mathura. The aftermath of the Kurukshetra War is believed to have taken place in the area between the Upper Doab and Delhi, in what was Kuru Mahajanapada, during the reign of the Pandava King Yudhishthira. The kingdom of the Kurus corresponds to the Black and Red Ware and Painted Gray Ware culture and the beginning of the Iron Age in northwest India, around 1000 BCE.
Control over Gangetic plains region was of vital importance to the power and stability of all of India's major empires, including the Maurya (320–200 BCE), Kushan (100–250 CE), Gupta (350–600), and Gurjara-Pratihara (650–1036) empires. Following the Huns' invasions that broke the Gupta empire, the Ganges-Yamuna Doab saw the rise of Kannauj. During the reign of Harshavardhana (590–647), the Kannauj empire reached its zenith. It spanned from Punjab in the north and Gujarat in the west to Bengal in the east and Odisha in the south. It included parts of central India, north of the Narmada River and it encompassed the entire Indo-Gangetic Plain.
Many communities in various parts of India claim descent from the migrants of Kannauj. Soon after Harshavardhana's death, his empire disintegrated into many kingdoms, which were invaded and ruled by the Gurjara-Pratihara empire, which challenged Bengal's Pala Empire for control of the region. Kannauj was several times invaded by the South Indian Rashtrakuta dynasty, from the 8th century to the 10th century. After the fall of the Pala empire, the Chero dynasty ruled from the 12th century to the 18th century.
Uttar Pradesh was partially or entirely ruled by the Delhi Sultanate for 320 years (1206–1526). Five dynasties ruled over the Delhi Sultanate sequentially: the Mamluk dynasty (1206–90), the Khalji dynasty (1290–1320), the Tughlaq dynasty (1320–1414), the Sayyid dynasty (1414–51), and the Lodi dynasty (1451–1526).
The first Sultan of Delhi, Qutb ud-Din Aibak, conquered some parts of Uttar Pradesh, including Meerut, Aligarh, and Etawah. His successor, Iltutmish, expanded the Sultanate's rule over Uttar Pradesh by defeating the King of Kannauj. During the reign of Sultan Balban, the Mamluk dynasty faced numerous rebellions in the state, but he was able to suppress them and establish his authority. Alauddin Khilji, extended his conquests to various regions in the state, including Varanasi and Prayagraj.