Timeline of the European colonization of North America

This is a chronology and timeline of the colonization of North America, with founding dates of selected European settlements. See also European colonization of the Americas.

Before Columbus

• 986: Norsemen settle Greenland and Bjarni Herjólfsson sights coast of North America, but doesn't land (see also Norse colonization of the Americas).
• c. 1000: Norse settle briefly in L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland.
• c. 1450: Norse colony in Greenland dies out.
• 1473: João Vaz Corte-Real perhaps reaches Newfoundland; writes about the "Land of Cod fish" in his journal.

Late fifteenth century

• 1491: Columbus sets sail aboard the Niña, Pinta, and Santa Maria.
• 1492: Columbus reaches the Bahamas, Cuba and Hispaniola.
• 1492: La Navidad is established on the island of Hispaniola; it was destroyed by the following year.
• 1493: The colony of La Isabela is established on the island of Hispaniola.
• 1493: Columbus arrives in Puerto Rico
• 1494: Columbus arrives in Jamaica.
• 1496: Santo Domingo, the first European permanent settlement, is built.
• 1497: John Cabot reaches Newfoundland.
• 1498: In his third voyage, Columbus reaches Trinidad and Tobago.
• 1498: La Isabela is abandoned by the Spanish.
• 1499: João Fernandes Lavrador maps Labrador and Newfoundland

Sixteenth century

• 1501: Corte-Real brothers explore the coast of what is today the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador
• 1502: Columbus sails along the mainland coast south of Yucatán, and reaches present-day Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama
• 1503: Las Tortugas noted by Columbus in passage through the Western Caribbean present-day Cayman Islands
• 1508: Ponce de León founds Caparra on San Juan Bautista (now Puerto Rico)
• 1511: Conquest of Cuba begins
• 1513: Ponce de León in Florida
• 1513: Núñez de Balboa claims the Pacific Ocean and its shores for Spain
• 1515: Conquest of Cuba completed
• 1517: Francisco Hernández de Córdoba lands on the Yucatán Peninsula
• 1519: Founding of Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz (Veracruz)
• 1519: Álvarez de Pineda explores the Gulf Coast of the United States
• 1519: Founding of Panama City by Pedro Arias Dávila
• 1521: Hernán Cortés completes the conquest of the Aztec Empire.
• 1521: Juan Ponce de León tries and fails to settle in Florida.
• 1524: Pedro de Alvarado conquers present-day Guatemala and El Salvador.
• 1524: Giovanni da Verrazzano sails along most of the east coast.
• 1525: Estêvão Gomes enters Upper New York Bay and reaches Nova Scotia
• 1526: Lucas Vázquez de Ayllón briefly establishes the failed settlement of San Miguel de Gualdape in South Carolina, the first site of enslavement of Africans in North America and of the first slave rebellion.
• 1527: Fishermen are using the harbor at St. John's, Newfoundland and other places on the coast.
• 1531: Spanish found Puebla de Zaragoza and Santiago de Querétaro.
• 1535: Jacques Cartier reaches Quebec.
• 1536: Cabeza de Vaca reaches Mexico City after wandering through North America.
• 1538: Failed Huguenot settlement on St. Kitts in the Caribbean (destroyed by the Spanish).
• 1539: Hernando de Soto explores the interior from Florida to Arkansas.
• 1539: Francisco de Ulloa explores the Baja California peninsula.
• 1540: Coronado travels from Mexico to eastern Kansas.
• 1541: Spanish found Nueva Ciudad de Mechuacán (Morelia)
• 1540: López de Cárdenas reaches the Grand Canyon (the area is ignored for the next 200 years).
• 1541: Failed French settlement at Charlesbourg-Royal (Quebec City) by Cartier and Roberval.
• 1542: Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo reaches the California coast.
• 1559: Failed Spanish settlement at Pensacola, Florida.
• 1562: Failed Huguenot settlement in South Carolina (Charlesfort-Santa Elena site).
• 1564: French Huguenots at Jacksonville, Florida (Fort Caroline).
• 1565: Spanish slaughter French 'heretics' at Fort Caroline.
• 1565: Spanish found Saint Augustine, Florida. (Mission Nombre de Dios)
• 1566–1587: Spanish in South Carolina (Charlesfort-Santa Elena site).
• 1568: Dutch revolt against Spain begins. The economic model developed in the Netherlands would define colonial policies in the next two centuries.
• 1570: Failed Spanish settlement on Chesapeake Bay (Ajacán Mission).
• 1576: Spanish found León de los Aldama.
• 1576: Martin Frobisher reaches the coast of Labrador and Baffin Island.
• 1579: Sir Francis Drake claims New Albion.
• 1583: England formally claims Newfoundland (Humphrey Gilbert).
• 1585: Roanoke Colony founded by English on Roanoke Island, North Carolina, failed in 1587
• 1598: Failed French settlement on Sable Island off Nova Scotia.
• 1598: Spanish settlement in Northern New Mexico.
• 1600: By 1600 Spain and Portugal were still the only significant colonial powers. North of Mexico the only settlements were Saint Augustine and the isolated outpost in northern New Mexico. Exploration of the interior was largely abandoned after the 1540s. Around Newfoundland 500 or more boats annually were fishing for cod and some fishermen were trading for furs, especially at Tadoussac on the Saint Lawrence.

Seventeenth century

• 1604 – St. Croix Island – French
• 1605 – Port Royal (Annapolis Royal) – French
• 1607 – Jamestown – English
• 1607 – Popham Colony – English
• 1608 – Quebec – French
• 1610 – Cuper's Cove – English
• 1610 – Kecoughtan, Virginia – English
• 1610 – Santa Fe – Spanish
• 1611 – Henricus – English
• 1612 – Bermuda - English
• 1615 – Fort Nassau – Dutch
• 1615 – Renews, Newfoundland – English
• 1618 – Bristol's Hope – English

Map of the northern part and parts of the southern parts of the Americas, from the mouth of the Saint Laurent River to the Island of Cayenne,with the new discoveries of the Mississippi (or Colbert) River. This map shows the results of the expeditions of Father Marquette and L. Jolliet (1673) and the Cavelier de la Salle expedition in the Mississippi valley. The map shows three forts built between 1679 and 1680: Conty fort (near Niagara Falls), Miamis Fort (south of Michigan lake), and Crèvecœur fort (Left bank of the Illinois River). Mississippi river course is only shown upstream of the Ohio confluence. Map by French Claude Bernou in 1681.

• 1620 – St. John's, Newfoundland – English
• 1620 – Plymouth Colony – English
• 1621 – Nova Scotia – Scottish
• 1622 – Province of Maine – English
• 1623 – Portsmouth – English
• 1623 – Stage Point – English
• 1623 – Dover – English
• 1623 – Pannaway – English
• 1623 – New Castle – English
• 1623 – Fort Nassau – Dutch
• 1624 – St. Kitts – English
• 1624 – Governors Island – Dutch
• 1624 – New Amsterdam – Dutch
• 1625 – Cape Breton – Scottish
• 1626 – Salem – English
• 1630 – Massachusetts Bay Colony – English
• 1630 – Pavonia – Dutch
• 1631 – Saint John, New Brunswick – English
• 1632 – Williamsburgh – English
• 1633 – Fort Hoop – Dutch
• 1633 – Windsor, Connecticut – English
• 1634 – Maryland Colony – English
• 1634 – Wethersfield – English
• 1635 – Territory of Sagadahock – English
• 1635 – Saybrook Colony - English
• 1636 – Providence Plantations – English
• 1636 – Connecticut Colony – English
• 1638 – New Haven Colony – English
• 1638 – Fort Christina – Swedish
• 1638 – Exeter – English
• 1638 – Hampton, New Hampshire - English
• 1639 – Bridgeport, Connecticut – English
• 1639 – Newport – English
• 1639 – San Marcos – Spanish
• 1640 – New Stockholm – Swedish
• 1640 – Swedesboro – Swedish
• 1642 – Montreal – French
• 1651 – Fort Casimir – Dutch
• 1652 - York, Maine
• 1653 - Biddeford, Maine
• 1658 - Scarborough, Maine
• 1660 – Bergen – Dutch
• 1665 – Elizabethtown – English
• 1666 – Newark – English
• 1668 – Sault Ste. Marie (Michigan) - French,
• 1669 – English Neighborhood – Dutch, English,
• 1670 – Charleston – English
• 1678 – New Paltz, New York – French
• 1679 – Acquackanonk – Dutch
• 1680 – Fort Crevecoeur (Peoria, Illinois) – French
• 1680 - El Paso - Spanish
• 1682 – Pennsylvania – English
• 1683 – Fort Saint Louis (Illinois) – French
• 1683 – East New Jersey – Scottish
• 1684 – Stuarts Town, Carolina – Scottish
• 1685 – Fort Saint Louis (Texas) – French
• 1686 – Arkansas Post - French
• 1691 – Fort Pimiteoui (Fort Crevecoeur, Peoria, Illinois) – French
• 1698 – Pensacola, Florida – Spanish
• 1699 – Louisiana – French

Eighteenth century

• 1701 – Detroit – French
• 1702 – Mobile – French
• 1704 – Delaware separated from Pennsylvania
• 1706 - Albuquerque - Spanish
• 1714 – Natchitoches - French
• 1714 – Germanna, Virginia – Germans from Hessen-Nassau
• 1716 – Natchez – French
• 1717 – Germanna, Virginia – Germans from Baden-Württemberg
• 1718 – New Orleans – French
• 1718 – San Antonio – Spanish
• 1721 – Germanna, Virginia – Germans
• 1721 – Greenland – Danish
• 1729 – Baltimore – British
• 1733 – Province of Georgia – British
• 1734 – Culpeper, Virginia – Germans
• 1738 – Culpeper, Virginia; some to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania – Germans
• 1741 - Guanajuato - Spain
• 1763 – St. Louis (Missouri) – French
• 1769 – San Diego – Spanish
• 1770 – Monterey – Spanish
• 1775 – Tucson – Spanish
• 1776 – San Francisco – Spanish
• 1777 – San Jose – Spanish
• 1781 – Los Angeles – Spanish
• 1784 – Kodiak Island – Russian
• 1787 – U.S. constitution written – American
• 1791 – Santa Cruz – Spanish