There are over 500,000 islands in the world today. They have a variety of sizes. Many of these islands are very small. Two people can fit on them, no more. However, there are those islands, the size of which is equal to the whole countries of the world. This article will focus on the largest island in the world.

Where is the most big Island in the world?

The largest island in the world is, of course, Greenland. It belongs to Denmark, but it has the right to self-government. This island is located beyond the Arctic Circle. Almost eighty percent of Greenland is covered by a gigantic glacier. Despite such unusual features of location and relief, numerous travel companies offer a large number of attractive tours to this place. Here, all tourists are promised an unusual pastime and unforgettable vacation surrounded by exotic nature.

This island is attractive for tourists. People come here who are not afraid of harsh climatic conditions. Almost the entire territory remains deserted due to heavy snow cover and harsh climate. Rest in this place can be really harsh. You need to be ready for this. Therefore, tourists need determination in order to withstand all the trials that will lie in wait for them while traveling around the island.

Greenland is much larger than Denmark. The territory is about fifty times larger than this state. Self-government was introduced on the island six years ago. Denmark is engaged in the military defense of this territory and resolves all political issues. The island has its own judicial system, which is guided by local laws.

Climatic features of the island of Greenland

The climate in southern and northern Greenland is very different. This is due to the fact that its territory occupies a large area. The climate varies from arctic to subarctic. Surprising is the fact that during the summer, many areas of Greenland can warm up to 21 degrees Celsius. On average, the temperature here at this time of the year does not rise above 0 degrees Celsius. In winter, the temperature averages minus 27 degrees Celsius. It is not easy for people living in the coastal zone. This is due to the fact that very strong winds blow here.

It should be noted that the name this island Literally translated as Green Country. This is surprising, because there are practically no green areas that would contribute to the development of agriculture.

What attracts tourists to Greenland?

Tourists love the nature of this island. There are amazingly beautiful places with original landscape features. In addition, such natural phenomena that are available here are not found anywhere else in the world. Summer local beauty nature can be enjoyed even at night when the sun is shining. However, because of it, it is almost impossible to admire northern lights. That's why best time to monitor natural phenomenon is the middle of spring.

Population of Greenland

The original inhabitants of Greenland are the Eskimos. Them national language is Greenlandic. However, the local population also speaks Danish. AT northern regions Eskimos still build igloos to live in. The population is not engaged in agriculture. The main industries here are fishing and hunting. Salmon, cod and other fish products are exported.

Islands are small areas of land that are found in almost every body of water, including rivers. They can have a different origin - there are volcanic hills that are generated due to magma released during eruptions, and there are others created from land areas cut off from the coast.

The process of formation of new islands and their absorption by waters is constantly taking place, every now and then new heights appear and old ones disappear, and this is completely normal. However, the largest objects remain unchanged. Having considered the top largest islands world, you can find out which of them are the most stable - they are all inhabited by people who are in no hurry to leave their homes.

Fifth place - Baffin land

An exception is, perhaps, Baffin Island, which is the fifth largest island on the planet, and is located somewhat west of Greenland. The population here is no more than 11 thousand people, and the central part of the territories is still little explored. The reason for this is the harsh climate that distinguishes this place. The area of ​​the island is 508 thousand sq. km, and the name was given in honor of William Baffin, the first person to describe the territories. It's just here wonderful nature and fabulous views, and besides, there are places where a person did not have time
visit.

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Fourth place - Madagascar

The island of Madagascar is located near Africa, and today it is known even to children, due to the cartoon about animals. On this island there is a separate state of Madagascar, which has sovereignty, and the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthis piece of land, which is not of volcanic origin, is 587040 sq. km. It has its own flora and fauna, formed in isolation, the island is rich in endemic species. And there are many minerals here. By the way, the name Madagascar itself is translated from the local dialect as Boar Island.

Third place - Kalimantan

Island - Kalimantan

The same island is known as Borneo. Its area is 737 thousand square meters. km, which allows him to get the third largest size in the world. This island is located at a real sea crossroads, it is washed by 4 seas and 2 straits at once. It is almost completely covered with forests, up to 80 percent of the territory is impenetrable jungle. There are 3 states on the island at once, which receive large profits from the timber industry, and are mainly engaged in this business. But wood, including precious species, is not everything, there is also oil, diamonds, gas, so the subsoil and natural reserves of this place are only pleasing. And its name is translated as Diamond River - it speaks for itself. After all, a recreational resource also brings profit here, tourists and vacationers come here.

There are about 500 thousand islands in the seas and oceans of the planet, of which no more than two percent are inhabited. In terms of area, such land formations can accommodate entire states, and can hardly accommodate even one person. Tectonic processes cause the appearance of new islands and the flooding of old ones, and land areas surrounded by sea water are also formed due to the activities of a person who creates artificial territories.

1. Greenland

The largest island on the planet is Greenland, its area exceeds 2.130 million km 2. The territory is washed by the waters of the Arctic and Atlantic oceans. The island belongs to Denmark and is an autonomous administrative unit with a population of 57.7 thousand people, most of whom are Greenlandic Eskimos. The capital of Greenland is Nuuk with a population of 16,583 and an area of ​​6.9 km2. The island is located in the northeast North America. The climate of the territory is heterogeneous and changeable, the mildest weather noted on the southwest coast.

2. New Guinea

The second largest island in the world New Guinea, has an area of ​​786 thousand square meters. The area is located in pacific ocean north of Australia. southern part The islands are washed by the waters of the Coral and Arafura Seas. The main land area belongs to the state of Papua New Guinea, its western part belongs to Indonesia. The island is 2000 km long and over 700 km wide. Representing a piece of land with an equatorial and subequatorial climate, the island has a rich animal and vegetable world, as well as excellent conditions for beach tourism.

3. Kalimantan

The island of Kalimantan, which has the third indicator in the world and an area of ​​​​734 thousand km 2, is slightly inferior in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bNew Guinea. The most common name is Borneo, on planet Earth it is the only island whose territory is divided between three states. Kalimantan is under the jurisdiction of such countries as Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia. In total, 19.8 million people live on the island. The territory is washed by the waters of the Java and South China Seas, as well as the Sulu and Sulawesi Seas, and others.

4. Madagascar

The fourth island in the world is Madagascar, whose territory exceeds 584 km2. Located near eastern shores Africa, washed by the waters indian ocean, separated from the mainland by the Mozambique Channel. It is 1600 km long and 600 km wide. On the island is the state of the same name, the capital of which is Antananarivo. The climate of Madagascar is predominantly tropical. In the central part of the island, there is the Anjafi high plateau; five mountain ranges. The world-famous lemurs live only in Madagascar.

5 Baffin Island

Baffin Island ranks fifth in the world in terms of area, with an indicator of 507.4 thousand km 2. Belongs to Canada and is part of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. It is located to the north of the mainland and is washed by the waters of the Arctic Ocean. The territory of the island has numerous freshwater lakes, the largest of which Nettilling covers an area of ​​5542 km2. A little over 11,000 people live on Baffin Island. More significant resettlement is hindered by harsh climatic conditions.

6. Sumatra

Located in the western part of the Malay Archipelago, Sumatra is the sixth largest island in the world. Its territories occupy 473 thousand km 2 with a length of 1.8 thousand km and a width of 435 km. The island is located in both hemispheres of the planet, divided by the equator almost in half. Sumatra is part of Indonesia, 50.6 million people live on the island territory. On land, there is Lake Toby, located in a huge caldera, it covers an area of ​​​​1103 km 2, and a 120-meter waterfall Sipiso-piso, the source of which is an underground river.

7. UK

Great Britain is recognized as the seventh largest island in the world, the territory of which is occupied by the state of the same name, including England, Wales and Scotland, with its capital in London. The area of ​​the island occupies 229.9 thousand km 2, with a length of 1440 km and a width of up to 660 km. The territory is home to 63 million people, which makes the island the third largest in the world in terms of the number of inhabitants. Great Britain is washed by the waters Atlantic Ocean. The island is home to Loch Lomond, which has an area of ​​71 km2. Located Island state in northwest direction from continental Europe.

8. Honshu

The second most populous island in the world, Honshu is the eighth largest island on the planet. The territory of 227.9 thousand km 2 is slightly inferior to Great Britain. More than 100 million people live on the island, it is the largest in the Japanese archipelago. Honshu is 1,300 km long and 230 km wide. The area of ​​the island is 60 percent of all the territories of Japan. Washed by the waters of the Pacific Ocean, the length coastline 5450 km. Honshu is home to Mount Fuji, the symbol and active stratovolcano of Japan.

9. Victoria

Victoria Island, which is part of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, has an area of ​​217.2 thousand km 2, occupying the ninth position in the ranking. The island territory is washed by the waters of the Arctic Ocean and belongs to Canada. The harsh climate does not allow to populate this piece of land, which is home to 1,700 people. The maximum length is 500 km, with the largest width being 600 km. There are numerous lakes on the island, the largest of which, Ferguson, occupies 588 km 2. Victoria is part of the North American Polar Tundra Ecological Region.

10 Ellesmere

Another island, which is part of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, ranks tenth in the ranking. The area of ​​the territories is 196.2 thousand km 2, in its eastern part the border of Canada and Greenland passes, 146 people live on the island, the climate is polar arctic. Here is the northernmost settlement in the world Alert, in which only five people live. In total, there are three settlements on Ellesmere.

About a third of the area is covered by glaciers. The polar night can last up to five months. Winter temperatures reach -50 °С. highest point island is the peak of Barbeau with a height of 2616 meters.

When talking about the largest islands, as a rule, they mean the islands with the largest area. We will not break the tradition and give the top of the largest islands in the world by area.

Recall that the island differs from the mainland in smaller size, but it must be surrounded on all sides by water, and at high tide at least part of it must remain on the surface.

10 Ellesmere

Ellesmere is the tenth largest island in the world. It belongs to Canada and is part of the Queen Elizabeth Islands.

Ellesmere is all cut up by fjords and one-third covered with ice. Living conditions are very harsh: in winter the temperature is up to -59 degrees, and in summer it rarely exceeds +7 (although it can also be +20); the polar day and night last for 5 months, and there is so little precipitation, so that in many places there is not even snow, only bare rocks.

The population does not exceed 150 people. The vegetation is exclusively herbaceous; blooming poppies, saxifrage and other polar flowers form a picturesque carpet in summer. There are many animals on Ellesmere, among them the rare Peary caribou and the Melville island wolf (smaller, with white or silver hair).

It's another one north island belonging to Canada. Still, it is not located in such high latitudes, so its nature is more diverse, and its population is larger (about 1,700 people).

The reason for this is the high humidity: the whole island is covered with swamps, lakes, streams and rivers. In summer, the temperature is up to +12, in winter - an average of -20 degrees, and the wind is very strong and gusty, which creates extremely uncomfortable living conditions.

Vegetation in Victoria is not rich: grasses, polar tree species, mosses. But animal world presented excellently. On the island you can meet many birds, including polar owls, as well as polar bears and wolves, arctic foxes and musk oxen.

Seals and walruses rest on the coast, and killer whales and whales walk in the waters off the coast of the island. There are also many commercial fish (herring, tuna).

8 Honshu

And here we have a quite densely populated island, main island The Japanese archipelago, where the capital of the Land of the Rising Sun is located and about 75% of its population is concentrated.

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It is here that the most big cities Japan: Tokyo, Hiroshima, Kyoto, Yokohama. The whole island is covered with mountains, volcanoes predominate (for example, Fujiyama, and Asama is active volcano), and he himself lies at the junction of the formation plates, which provokes frequent earthquakes.

Devastating typhoons are not uncommon here in autumn. The climate of Honshu is defined as monsoonal: in summer the temperature is about +25, in winter it is rarely below -5. The rainy season starts in June-July. The flora and fauna of the island is very rich. Forests cover more than 2/3 of the area.

In the spring, Honshu is extraordinarily beautiful because of the blooming azaleas, sakura and peonies, and in the autumn the most favorite flowers of the Japanese bloom - chrysanthemums, which even the traditional festival is dedicated to.

The animal world includes many relict and endemic species: white-breasted bear, Japanese crane, giant salamander, big-billed crow and others. But Honshu is especially rich in fish and seafood, because 700 species of fish and more than 1000 species of shellfish live off the coast.

7 Great Britain is one of the largest islands of the Earth

The island of Great Britain is a densely populated island, according to this indicator, it ranks third after Java and Honshu. Most of the UK is located here.

Scientists believe that the first people appeared on the island 800 thousand years ago: this is how the stone tools found on its territory are dated. The ancient Romans mentioned Great Britain in the 3rd century BC.

The climate on the island is maritime, which ensures mild winters, comfortable temperatures in summer and more than half of the rainy days a year. Although there are areas in which it is much drier.
Forests and large animals in Great Britain, unfortunately, are almost exterminated: magnificent beech and hornbeam groves occupy no more than a tenth of the island.

Of the animals, mostly not very large mammals survived, but more than 130 species of birds and a lot of fish, as well as seals and whales

6 Sumatra

The hot tropical island, which is the sixth largest in the world, is at the same time the fourth largest in terms of the number of people living on it.

The island is part of the Malay Archipelago and belongs to Indonesia. Sumatra is an extremely humid island. On him great amount rivers, streams, lakes. This is where the most big lake South-East Asia- Toba. It is located in the caldera of an ancient volcano and is so large that there is an island on it, which also has a lake.

Sumatra is very rich in volcanoes: there are many of them, and a good dozen of them are active. However, this does not frighten numerous tourists who want to see medieval buildings, windsurf or dive, enjoy beach holiday on the coast, almost everywhere covered with dark (volcanic) sand.

And here you can also walk in the equatorial forests of tree ferns, palm trees and ficuses, marveling at the richness of the Sumatran fauna. There are many endemic species here. For example, the Sumatran tiger and rhinoceros, as well as the rare woolly wing, the Indian elephant, the pig-tailed macaque and others. There are even 450 species of birds on the island!

5 Baffin Island

Listing the largest islands in the world, it is impossible to ignore Baffin Land, an island of large area and very bizarre shape, belonging to Canada.
Baffin Island is, in fact, a continuation (geologically) of the Canadian Shield, so the mountains on the island should be considered part of the Andes. And there are many mountains, including quite high ones.

The island is not rich in population: the climate here is harsh, a significant part of the island is located beyond the Arctic Circle, frosts are not uncommon even in summer.

For a long time it was believed that the island was discovered by Baffin. But the latest data archaeological sites allow us to assert that the island was known to the ancient Vikings and is mentioned in their sagas under the name Helluland.

The harsh climate does not allow much development of vegetation, the flora here is poor. Of the animals, there are arctic foxes, polar bears, lemmings, reindeer, polar hares and, of course, walruses and seals. The island also amazes with a large number of birds, including snowy owls.

4 Madagascar

Talking about which island is the largest in the world, it is impossible to ignore Madagascar, located near Africa and only recently emerged from the protectorate of France. At the moment, the independent republic of Madagascar is located on the island, the government in which is replaced every now and then as a result of various upheavals and military coups.

However, the history of Madagascar is also full of such events. There were also attempts to seize the island by force, and various tricks. For some time, Madagascar was even a base for pirates who robbed the ships of merchants hurrying to India.

The climate in Madagascar is tropical and monsoonal, which allows many plants to flourish, including many endemics. And the most famous is the fire tree (royal delonix) - a ten-meter tree of extraordinary beauty, strewn with bright scarlet flowers.
Among the animals there are also many endemic ones, for example, fossa is a cross between a puma and a mongoose.

There are also such interesting animals in Madagascar as lemurs (there are more than fifty species of them here!), bristly hedgehogs, chameleons, viverras, turtles, a huge number of insects, fish (for example, the famous moray eels), birds. It’s a pity that you won’t be able to swim here: the coast is full of sharks.

3 Kalimantan

The island of Kalimantan, which occupies the third place in the ranking, is often called Borneo - after the name of the state of Brunei, which was once big and powerful, and now occupies only a small part of the island. The rest is divided between Indonesia and Malaya - Kalimantan is the only island on Earth, which belongs to three states at once.

Over the centuries, various parts of the island passed under the rule of one or another state; in different places and at different times, the British, and Holland, and even Japan were noted here. And only in the period from the middle to the end of the last century, the modern political status of Kalimantan was established.

The equatorial climate and high humidity are favorable for a huge number of plants and animals, many of which are endemic and have not yet been properly studied. Orchids and carnivorous plants, king cobra and reticulated python, proboscis and giant flying foxes - you can't list them all!

A huge hot island in the Pacific Ocean is divided between the states of Indonesia and Papua New Guinea.

The climate is equatorial, there are quite high (up to 4900 m) mountains, and along the coast there is an impenetrable (it can only be overcome by canoeing) strip of mango forests.

In New Guinea, expanse of flora and fauna: there are 11 thousand species of plants (various palm trees, bananas, melon tree, etc.) and more than one and a half thousand animals, including marsupial badgers and birds of paradise. On the island, scientists have found a place that they called the "Garden of Eden": there are many unseen creatures that are not at all afraid of humans.

1 The largest island is Greenland

Which country owns the largest island in the world? Answer: Denmark. Greenland is its autonomy.

More than 80% of the island is covered by glaciers; from the west and east, outlet glaciers (descending tongues into the sea) form, which give rise to icebergs. In the east of Greenland is also the most high mountain Arctic - Gunbjorn. Its height is 3700 m.

The climate is not very harsh, but changeable: in winter the temperature is up to -11 degrees, in summer - about +20, but it is not uncommon for years when the thermometer does not overcome the zero mark for the whole summer!

Plants can be found in areas free from the glacier. These are mainly meadows, crooked forests, junipers. But polar animals, fish and insects are quite widely represented: walruses, whales, seals, polar bear, polar deer, seagull, shark and dozens of unique endemic beetles (700 species of insects in total).