Samoa 🇼🇸

Samoa is a country in Polynesia, one of the 10 entries this site files under that subregion. In formal use it is Independent State of Samoa. The capital is Apia.

Its territory runs to 2,842 km², which ranks it 179th of the 249 countries and territories in this dataset — just behind South Georgia and just ahead of Luxembourg. That makes it a little larger than Luxembourg.

Some 218,019 people call it home, placing it 188th of 249 by population — between São Tomé and Príncipe above it and Saint Lucia below. Among the 10 entries in Polynesia it ranks 2nd by area and 2nd by population.

Samoa has no land border with any country, which changes what "nearby" means. Measured centre to centre in a straight line, the closest other entry on this site is American Samoa, roughly 270 km away. These are approximate distances between representative points, not the shortest crossing between two shorelines, so treat them as a sense of scale rather than a sailing chart.

No land border also means no land crossing: everything and everyone arrives by sea or by air. That single fact drives a lot of what follows on this page, from how goods reach the shops to why Samoa's dialling code and internet domain are worth knowing before you travel.

The coordinates the dataset gives are 13.6° S, 172.3° W, which puts it in the southern hemisphere, roughly 1,512 km from the equator, in what geographers would call tropical latitudes.

Angola, Zambia and Malawi sit at almost exactly the same latitude on other parts of the globe.

No land border connects it to another country. That puts it among the 85 entries of 249 here with no land neighbours, which shapes how it trades and who it deals with.

Population divided by land area gives roughly 77 people per square kilometre, which makes it less crowded than the typical entry on this list. For comparison, the median entry on this list sits near 91 per square kilometre.

The demonym is Samoan, so residents are Samoans.

It recognises 2 languages: English and Samoan. English, the first listed, is shared with 90 other entries worldwide.

Inside Oceania it places 9th of 27 by population, and it accounts for 31% of everyone living in Polynesia.

Put next to every other entry on this site, Samoa ranks 179th of 249 by area and 188th by population. That works out at less than a thousandth of a percent of the combined land area of all 249 entries and less than a thousandth of a percent of their combined population. Those denominators matter: this list includes territories and dependencies as well as UN member states, so a rank here is not the same as a rank among sovereign countries.

For a sense of scale, the entries immediately either side of Samoa in the size ordering are South Georgia at 3,903 km² and Luxembourg at 2,586 km², against Samoa's 2,842 km². If you can already picture one of those, you can picture this one.

Density tells a different story from either raw figure. Samoa averages 77 people per square kilometre of total area, which makes it middling in density — 138th of the 247 entries that have both a population and a measured area. Total area includes inland water, so the true figure for habitable land is higher than this.

The Samoan tālā (WST) is used only in Samoa among the 249 entries on this site. Its own currency is one of the clearest markers of an economy that sets its own monetary policy rather than importing somebody else's.

Language reaches wider still. English is listed for 91 entries here, Samoa among them, so a visitor who speaks it can be understood across a large part of the map. Shared language tends to outlive the empires, trade routes and migrations that spread it, which is why the linguistic map and the political one rarely line up.

The currency is the Samoan tālā (T, WST). That currency appears nowhere else on this list.

Apia is the seat of government and the answer most quizzes are looking for.

Its internet country code is .ws. The international dialling code is +685. In ISO terms it is ws in two letters and WSM in three.

As a sovereign state it is among the 192 UN members listed here. The other 57 entries are territories, dependencies or observers, which is why totals on this site run to 249 rather than the familiar 195.

Zoom in from the world to Polynesia and Samoa sits 2nd of 10 by population and 2nd by area. Its immediate company in that ordering is French Polynesia just above and Tonga just below, which is a more honest comparison set than a global league table.

French Polynesia is the largest of the group by population, and every entry in Polynesia has its own page here if you want to work through the whole neighbourhood rather than one country at a time.

• 🇵🇫 French Polynesia
• 🇹🇴 Tonga
• 🇵🇫 French Polynesia