Country · Europe
Iceland
Iceland is a country in Northern Europe. Its capital city is Reykjavik. About 353 thousand people live there, in an area of 103 000 square kilometres.
Picture credit: Jakub Hałun (CC BY 4.0) · Martin Falbisoner (CC BY-SA 4.0) · Tiffany Bailey (CC BY 2.0) · Hedwig Storch (CC BY-SA 3.0) · Wikimedia Commons
Where is Iceland?
Iceland lies in Northern Europe, on the continent of Europe.
It sits in the northern half of the world, roughly 7 236 km from the equator.
Its coastline is about 4 970 km long.
It has no land neighbours — every border it has is with the sea.
How big is Iceland?
Iceland covers 103 000 square kilometres.
That is about 2.5 times the size of Switzerland.
Among the world's countries that makes it the 106th largest.
If everybody spread out evenly, there would be about 3.4 people on every square kilometre.
Who lives in Iceland?
About 353 thousand people live in Iceland.
That is the 171st biggest population in the world.
People here speak Icelandic.
They pay with the Icelandic króna (kr).
On average, people born here can expect to live about 79 years.
The land of Iceland
The land in Iceland sits on average 557 metres above sea level.
Its coast runs for about 4 970 km. Walking it end to end, at twenty kilometres a day, would take roughly 249 days.
It lies between the tropics and the poles, which is the single biggest reason its weather is the way it is.
What makes Iceland different?
A dish the country is known for: Hákarl and Þorramatur.
Websites from here often end in .is.
Iceland and the rest of the world
Out of every thousand people alive on Earth, about 0 live in Iceland.
It takes up about 0.08 % of all the land that countries stand on.
Within Europe it is the 16th largest of 45 countries, and the 40th most populated.
That is emptier than the world average of roughly 60 people per square kilometre.
Nature and animals
Of the animals on this site, 4 live wild in Iceland: Arctic fox, Atlantic puffin, Blue whale and Orca.
Photographs from Wikimedia Commons under free licences — every credit is on the page itself and in the picture credits.
Where this country lands in the record lists
Questions children ask
What is the capital of Iceland?
The capital of Iceland is Reykjavik. It is the city where the country's government works from.
How many people live in Iceland?
About 353 thousand people live in Iceland, which makes it the 171st most populated country in the world. (Source: World Bank, 2018.)
How big is Iceland?
Iceland covers 103 000 square kilometres, making it the 106th largest country in the world. That is about 2.5 times the size of Switzerland.
Which continent is Iceland in?
Iceland is in Europe, in the part called Northern Europe.
Where these numbers come from
Borders and outlines: Natural Earth. Names, capitals, areas, languages and currencies: ISO 3166 data (world-countries). Population: World Bank, 2018. Every derived figure on this page (ranks, density, distance from the equator) is calculated from those values.
Last checked: · How these pages are made