More insight on rare earth element pathways from land to ocean comes from analyses of suspended matter in four major world rivers (Amazon, Congo, Ganges, Mekong), while their geochemical behavior at the river-ocean boundary has been studied in the Gironde estuary (France). The Gironde data indicate that soluble rare earth elements are removed from solution in the estuarine zone; this observation invalidates any rare earth element balance to the ocean which would not take into account the river-ocean boundary processes. Data on rare earth element concentrations in soluble and detrital river loads show that solid discharge represents the major part of rare earth elements supplied by rivers to the ocean. A rare earth material balance to the ocean is discussed on the basis of the results presented in this paper.