The York River is a navigable estuary, approximately 34 miles (55 km) long,[4] in eastern Virginia in the United States.

On the north bank (the Middle Peninsula), in what is now Gloucester County, the chief of the Powhatan Confederacy maintained Werowocomoco, one of two capitals of the paramount chiefdom at the time of European contact before 1609.

The peninsula formed by the York and the James rivers just to the south became the scene of the end campaign of the American Revolutionary War in October 1781.

The British Army under Cornwallis at Yorktown found itself cornered by the Americans under George Washington on land and by the French fleet at sea.

Also on the south shore are several large military reservations, including Camp Peary and the Naval Weapons Station Yorktown (and Cheatham Annex) of the U.S. Navy.

The only vehicular crossing of the York River is the George P. Coleman Memorial Bridge, a swing-type drawbridge which carries U.S. Highway 17 between Yorktown and Gloucester Point.