How many countries are there in the world?

It depends who's counting. The United Nations has 193 members. This map counts 197: those 193 plus Vatican City and Palestine (UN observer states), Kosovo and Taiwan, which most travel trackers include. Territories such as Greenland, Puerto Rico, Hong Kong or Gibraltar can be shaded too; switch on "Count territories" to include them in the total.

How is "% of the world" worked out?

It's the number of countries you've ticked divided by 197, or by every country and territory on the map when territories are counted. Every country weighs the same, whatever its size, so Monaco counts as much as Russia — which is how every travel tracker counts it.

Does it count Antarctica as a continent?

Yes. The map counts seven continents: Africa, Antarctica, Asia, Europe, North America, Oceania and South America. Antarctica isn't a country, so ticking it adds a continent but not a country. Russia is counted in Europe and Turkey in Asia.

Why can't I see small countries like Singapore or the Vatican?

At world scale they're smaller than a pixel, so the map marks them with a dot you can tap instead. Every country, however small, is also in the list by continent.

Is my map saved anywhere?

No. The map lives only in this page and in its link: nothing is sent to a server or stored in your browser, and the image is made on your device. Keep the link to come back to it. To keep your countries for good, and have them fill in from the flights you log, use the Orbit app.

Free tools

Countries visited map: shade every country you’ve been to

Tick the countries you’ve visited and watch the world fill in, with your count, the share of the world you’ve seen and how many continents. Download it for a post or a story, or share the link.

How it counts

What counts as a country, and what counts as a visit

The total is out of 197: the 193 UN member states, the two observer states — Vatican City and Palestine — and Kosovo and Taiwan, which most travel trackers count. The other 50places on the map, from Greenland to Hong Kong, are territories: you can shade them, and switch on “Count territories” to include them.

Each country counts once, whatever its size, so the percentage is of countries, not of land. Continents follow the usual seven, with Russia in Europe and Turkey in Asia: Europe has 45, Asia has 49, Africa has 54, North America has 23, South America has 12, Oceania has 14.

What counts as having been somewhere is yours to decide. Does a layover count? A day trip? We wrote up the established rule sets in Counting countries: what actually counts — the one most people settle on is that a country counts if you left the airport.

Borders are Natural Earth’s, drawn on the Equal Earth projection so every country keeps its true size. To map the flights between them, try the flight route map generator.

Countries visited

Questions about counting your countries

Search for each country and add it, tick them in the list by continent, or tap them on the map. You can also paste the airports you've flown from — LHR JFK NRT — and each adds the country it's in. The map shades as you go; download it as a square, landscape or story image, or copy the link to share it.

Want your countries to update automatically from your flights?

Build your Orbit: log a flight in two taps and its countries, continents and kilometres add themselves to a globe that keeps them. Offline, free to start.

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