75% of all Islands are Nordic

The country with the most islands in the world is neither Indonesia nor Australia. All the top three are in fact Nordic, but you may recently have been lied to about which country has the most, thanks to inaccurate posts on social media. In these Sweden usually comes up on top with its 267 570 islands, 62 percent of which are in lakes. That is a lot of islands! But no cigar, gold medal or celebration song.

Neighbouring Norway is home to a whopping 320 249 islands, over 88 percent of which are at sea. Not surprisingly perhaps as Norway has the second longest coastline in the world, only beaten by enormous Canada. Out of the the 357 municipalities in Norway, Nærøysund just south of the Arctic circle, can boast about the highest number of islands with around

7 000.  Vega, a few kilometers to the north, follows suit with over 6 500 whereas Vikna north of Trondheim and Smøla south west of the city have around 6 000 each. On average, each municipality in the country has almost 900 islands, the same as Malaysia.

A third of the worlds million or so islands are in fact Norwegian! Avid island chasers do certainly not need think twice about where to travel for their kicks as Nordic neighbour Finland takes bronze with 178 947 islands, 55 percent of which are in lakes. That means that the three neighbouring countries, that share a three-way border east of Tromsø in the Arctic, are home to 766 766 islands. That is almost 80 percent of all islands on the planet! No wonder that we may come across as a bit strange, then, with only 29 people per island on average. I love islands and the excitement of visiting new ones, I just had no idea that the rest of the world has so few of them. Another reason to come visit, perhaps?

Coincidentally Norway and Finland have almost exactly the same number of inhabitants. Finland narrowly beats Norway with 5 623 329 vs. 5 623 071 people, according to Worldometer. That is a difference of 258.

An island is defined as a piece of land completely surrounded by water, and smaller than a continent. The Norwegian Mapping Authority does however operate with a size related distinction between an island and an islet or skerry. The agency claims that an island must be over 10 square meters big, whereas an islet is smaller than that, which typically also means that it is uninhabitable with little or no vegetation. Norwegian Mapping Authority counts 239 057 islands and 81 192 islets, whereas most other countries define all pieces of land surrounded by water as islands. In some languages, different words are used depending on size, size and elevation, or by whether the piece of land is ever fully submerged by the tides at times or not. To be fair, we gotta compare apples with apples, not apples with motorcyles. In cases where counts vary, Wikipedia uses the highest reliably sourced figure.

A bit surprising, perhaps, that the worlds biggest country Russia is beaten by as many as 24 countries. Size doesn't always matter. 30 countries claim to have over a thousand islands, they are all listed below.

1. Norway              320 249

2. Sweden              267 570

3. Finland               178 947

   
   

4. Canada                52 455

5. Chile                     43 471

6. USA                       18 617

7. Indonesia            17 508

8. Japan                   14 125

9. Australia                 8 222

10. Philippines             7 641

    
    

11. China                       7 226

12. United Kingdom    6 346

13. Greece                    6 000

14. Cuba                        4 195

15. Laos 4 000

16. North Korea 3 579

17. South Korea            3 358

18. Vietnam 3 000

19. Estonia                    2 355

20. Iceland 2 000

    
    

21. France                     1 900           

22. Thailand                 1 430

23. India                        1 382

24. Mexico                    1 356

25. Russia                     1 338

26. Saudi Arabia 1 285

27. Croatia 1 246

28. Brazil 1 200

29. Maldives 1 192

30. Egypt 1 048

Sources:

Wikipedia, «List of countries by number of islands», retrieved 09 June 2025.

Staurset, Kjersti Baust, 24 November 2011, «Lengre kyst og flere øyer», Store norske leksikon, retrieved 06 June 2025 (pdf). Worldometer, «Countries in the world by population (2025)», retrieved 06 June 2025.