The Mitchell River is a river in Far North Queensland, Australia. The river rises on the Atherton Tableland about 50 kilometres northwest of Cairns and flows about 750 kilometres northwest across Cape York Peninsula from Mareeba to the Gulf of Carpentaria.
The rivers watershed covers an area of 71,757 km2. The Mitchell has the states largest discharge, at 11.3 million megalitres annually, but is intermittent and may be dry for part of the year. Lake Mitchell is the main water storage facility on the river.
It was named by Ludwig Leichhardt on 16 June 1845 after Sir Thomas Mitchell while he was on his overland expedition from Moreton Bay to Port Essington. It may have been previously named the Vereenighde River in 1623 by Dutch merchant and navigator Jan Carstensz.
