The Bahamas is a state that's recognized by other states that includes a series of islands that form an archipelago.
Guayaneco Archipelago . The islands of the Guayaneco Archipelago comprise a series of elongated islands and deep bays that are the traces of a drowned coastal range . The Kodiak Archipelago is an archipelago , or group of islands , south of the main land mass of the state of Alaska ( United States ) , about 405 km by air south of Anchorage in the Gulf of Alaska . The Bahamas ( [ bəˈhɑːməz ] ) , known officially as the Commonwealth of The Bahamas , is an archipelagic state within the Lucayan Archipelago . It consists of more than 700 islands , cays , and islets in the Atlantic Ocean and is located north of Cuba and Hispaniola ( Haiti and the Dominican Republic ) ; northwest of the Turks and Caicos Islands ; southeast of the US state of Florida and east of the Florida Keys . In terms of gross domestic product per capita , the Bahamas is one of the richest countries in the Americas ( following the United States and Canada ) , with an economy based on tourism and finance .