Is Australia the biggest island in the world?
Australia is the biggest island in the world, but only if you class it as an island rather than a continent. General consensus is that Australia is a continent, not an island. And that means Greenland is the biggest island in the world.
Australia is a massive place, and the biggest country in the world without a land border. The flight from Perth to Sydney across the country takes at least four hours, with the Perth to Sydney drive taking 41 hours. And some Australian states would be amongst the biggest countries in the world in their own right if they were independent.
Is Australia an island or a continent?
But is Australia the biggest island in the world? Well, it depends if you class it as an island or a continent.
If you class Australia as an island, then it is the biggest island in the world by a long distance. According to Geoscience Australia, the Australian mainland covers 7,591,608 square kilometres. This discounts Tasmania and other Australian islands such as Fraser Island, Groote Eylandt and Dirk Hartog Island.
However, convention dictates that Australia is not an island – it’s a continent. There are no strict criteria for differentiating between continents and islands. It’s just the way it has always been done. Essentially, geographers decided Australia was just too big to be an island. And if Australia is an island, who’s to say Antarctica isn’t an island? Or the Americas? Or Afro-Eurasia?
Biggest island in the world
So, if you discount Australia, what is the biggest island in the world? Well, Greenland wins that one by a significant distance. The area of Greenland is 2,130,800 square kilometres, which makes it much larger than any rivals.
The second largest island in the world is Papua New Guinea, with an area of 785,753km. Third, fourth and fifth place go to Borneo, Madagascar and Baffin Island.
The biggest island in Australia, of course, is Tasmania.
More Australia travel questions
Australian dollar to Philippine peso exchange rate
How many stars are on the Australian flag?
When is Mother’s Day in Australia?
When is Father’s Day in Australia?
What is the Japanese yen to Australian dollar exchange rate?