Northward means in the direction of north, or toward the north. If you're traveling northward from Texas, you might pass through Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska. A flock of geese flying northward in spring is heading back to their nesting grounds in Canada or Alaska after spending winter in warmer places.

You can use northward to describe any movement toward the north: a ship sailing northward across the Atlantic, a river flowing northward (like the Nile in Africa), or a family moving northward to a different state. The word works as both an adjective (a northward journey) and an adverb (they traveled northward).

Sometimes you'll see this word written as northwards, especially in British English, but both versions mean exactly the same thing. People also use similar words for the other directions: southward, eastward, and westward. These directional words are especially common in navigation, weather reports, and descriptions of exploration or migration.