Albatrosses are very large seabirds in the family Diomedeidae. They range widely in the Southern Ocean and the North Pacific. They are absent from the North Atlantic, although fossil remains show they once occurred there and occasional vagrants are found. Albatrosses are among the largest of flying birds, and species of the genus Diomedea have the longest wingspans of any extant birds, reaching up to 3.7 m. Albatrosses are usually regarded as falling into four genera, but disagreement exists over the number of species.
