This map highlights the world's most critical maritime chokepoints, narrow passages through which a disproportionate share of global trade, energy flows, and naval power must pass. Locations such as the Strait of Hormuz, Bab el-Mandeb, Suez Canal, Strait of Malacca, and the GIUK Gap function as strategic bottlenecks: disruption at any one can ripple rapidly through markets, supply chains, and security alliances.

Viewed together, these chokepoints reveal a central truth of geopolitics: control of narrow geography often matters more than control of vast territory. In an era of rising great-power competition, piracy, sanctions, and regional conflict, these passages represent both points of vulnerability and levers of influence in the global system.