("Green Sea"): Province in west‑central China, 278,000 square miles in area, with a population of 4,280,000. Capital: Xining (population: 620,000). Most of Qinghai is covered by inhospitable mountains and desert.

A Chinese province created in 1928 to administer the bulk of Tibet's AMDO region. In 1992, the population of Qinghai was estimated to be 4.61 million, [Fiske94] of whom 58 percent were ethnic Chinese, 20 percent were ethnic Tibetan, and 14 percent were Hui (Chinese Muslim). The ethnic Chinese population is concentrated in the vicinity of Xining, the capital. All of the province's other prefectures are classified as "Tibetan autonomous." Qinghai can also be referred to as Kokonor, the region's Mongolian name.

Postal map spelling: Tsinghai; ; Mongolian: Köke Naγur; Manchu: Huhu Noor) is a province of the People's Republic of China, named after the enormous Qinghai Lake. It borders Gansu on the northeast, the Xinjiang Autonomous Region on the northwest, Sichuan on the southeast, and Tibet Autonomous Region on the southwest.