The islands in the Pacific Ocean are categorized into three major island groups: Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Depending on the context, the term Pacific Islands may refer to one of several concepts: (1) those Pacific islands whose people have Austronesian origins, (2) the Pacific islands once or currently colonized after 1500 CE, (3) the geographical region of Oceania, or (4) any island located in the Pacific Ocean. Inhabitants of the Pacific islands are known as Pacific Islanders.
This list of islands in the Pacific Ocean is organized by archipelago or political boundary. In order to keep this list of moderate size, the more complete lists for countries with large numbers of small or uninhabited islands have been hyperlinked.
Name ambiguity and groupings A commonly applied biogeographic definition includes islands with oceanic geology that lie within Melanesia, Micronesia, Polynesia and the eastern Pacific (also known as the southeastern Pacific). These are usually considered to be the "Tropical Pacific Islands".Pacific Science Volume 46, April 1992 In the 1990s, ecologists Dieter Mueller-Dombois and Frederic Raymond Fosberg broke the Tropical Pacific Islands up into the following subdivisions: Western Melanesia The Bismarck Archipelago and other islands directly east of New Guinea Bougainville and Buka Island The Solomon Islands Eastern Melanesia The Santa Cruz Islands Vanuatu New Caledonia Fiji Subtropical islands in the Australia/New Zealand region Lord Howe Island Norfolk Island Micronesia The Bonin Islands and Volcano Islands Minamitorishima The Northern Marianas The Southern Marianas The Caroline Islands Nauru and Banaba Wake Island Palau The Marshall Islands The Gilbert Islands (Kiribati) Central Polynesia Johnston Atoll The Phoenix Islands The Line Islands Howland Island, Baker Island, Jarvis Island, Malden Island and Starbuck Island Tuvalu, Tokelau and the Northern Cook Islands (Pukapuka, Nassau, Rakahanga, Manihiki, Penrhyn, Suwarrow and Palmerston) Western Polynesia Tonga Samoan Islands Wallis and Futuna Niue Eastern Polynesia The rest of the Cook Islands The Austral Islands The Society Islands The Tuamotu Archipelago and the Pitcairn Islands Easter Island and Salas y Gómez The Marquesas Islands Northern Polynesia The Hawaiian Islands Oceanic islands of the Eastern Pacific The Revillagigedo Islands Cocos Island and Malpelo Island Clipperton Island The Galápagos Islands The Desventuradas Islands The Juan Fernández Islands
Geopolitics and Oceania grouping
The 2007 book Asia in the Pacific Islands: Replacing the West, by New Zealand Pacific scholar Ron Crocombe, considers the phrase Pacific Islands to politically encompass American Samoa, Australia, the Bonin Islands, the Cook Islands, Easter Island, East Timor, Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, French Polynesia, the Galápagos Islands, Guam, Hawaii, the Kermadec Islands, Kiribati, Lord Howe Island, the Marshall Islands, Nauru, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Norfolk Island, Niue, the Northern Mariana Islands, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Pitcairn Islands, Samoa, the Solomon Islands, Tokelau, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, the Torres Strait Islands, Wallis and Futuna, Western New Guinea and the United States Minor Outlying Islands (Baker Island, Howland Island, Jarvis Island, Midway Atoll, Palmyra Atoll and Wake Island). Crocombe noted that Easter Island, Lord Howe Island, Norfolk Island, the Galápagos Islands, the Kermadec Islands, the Pitcairn Islands and the Torres Strait Islands currently have no geopolitical connections to Asia, but that they could be of future strategic importance in the Asia-Pacific. Another definition given in the book for the term Pacific Islands is islands served by the Pacific Community, formerly known as the South Pacific Commission. It is a developmental organization whose members include Australia and the aforementioned islands which are not politically part of other countries. In his 1962 book War in the Pacific: Strategy and Command, American author Louis Morton places the insular landmasses of the Pacific under the label of the "Pacific World". He considers it to encompass areas that were involved in the Pacific Theater of World War II. These areas include the islands of Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia, as well as Australia, the Aleutian Islands, Indonesia, Japan, the Philippines, the Ryukyu Islands and Taiwan.
Since the beginning of the 19th century, Australia and the islands of the Pacific have been grouped by geographers into a region called Oceania. It is often used as a quasi-continent, with the Pacific Ocean being the defining characteristic. In some countries, such as Argentina, Brazil, China, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, France, Greece, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Peru, Spain, Switzerland or Venezuela, Oceania is seen as a proper continent in the sense that it is "one of the parts of the world". In his 1879 book Australasia, British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace commented that, "Oceania is the word often used by continental geographers to describe the great world of islands we are now entering upon" and that "Australia forms its central and most important feature." 19th century definitions encompassed the region as beginning in the Malay Archipelago, and as ending near the Americas. In the 19th century, many geographers divided up Oceania into mostly racially-based subdivisions; Australasia, Malaysia (encompassing the Malay Archipelago), Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia. The 1995 book The Pacific Island States, by Australian author Stephen Henningham, claims that Oceania in its broadest sense "incorporates all the insular areas between the Americas and Asia." In its broadest possible usage, it could include Australia, the Melanesian, Micronesian and Polynesian islands, the Japanese and Malay Archipelagos, Taiwan, the Ryukyu and Kuril Islands, the Aleutian Islands and isolated islands off Latin America such as the Juan Fernández Islands. Islands with geological and historical ties to the Asian mainland (such as those in the Malay Archipelago) are rarely included in present definitions of Oceania, nor are non-tropical islands to the north of Hawaii. The 2004 book The Making of Anthropology: The Semiotics of Self and Other in the Western Tradition, by Jacob Pandian and Susan Parman, states that "some exclude from Oceania the nontropical islands such as Ryukyu, the Aleutian islands and Japan, and the islands such as Formosa, Indonesia and the Philippines that are closely linked with mainland Asia. Others include Indonesia and the Philippines with the heartland of Oceania."
Certain anthropological definitions restrict Oceania even further to only include islands which are culturally within Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia. Conversely, Encyclopedia Britannica believe that the term Pacific Islands is much more synonymous with Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia, and that Oceania, in its broadest sense, embraces all the areas of the Pacific which do not fall within Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia. The World Factbook and the United Nations categorize Oceania/the Pacific area as one of the seven major continental divisions of the world, and the two organizations consider it to politically encompass American Samoa, Australia, Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, the Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, French Polynesia, Fiji, Guam, Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, Nauru, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Niue, Norfolk Island, the Northern Mariana Islands, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Pitcairn Islands, Samoa, the Solomon Islands, Tokelau, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Wallis and Futuna and the United States Minor Outlying Islands.
Since the 1950s, many (particularly in English-speaking countries) have viewed Australia as a continent-sized landmass, although they are still sometimes viewed as a Pacific Island, or as both a continent and a Pacific Island. Australia is a founding member of the Pacific Islands Forum, which is now recognized as the main governing body for the Oceania region. It functions as a trade bloc and deals with defense issues, unlike with the Pacific Community, which includes most of the same members. By 2021, the Pacific Islands Forum included all sovereign Pacific Island nations, such as Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji and Tonga, in addition to dependencies of other nations, such as American Samoa, French Polynesia and Guam. Islands which have been fully integrated into other nations, including Easter Island (Chile) and Hawaii (United States), have also shown interest in joining. Tony deBrum, Foreign Minister for the Marshall Islands, stated in 2014, "Not only is Australia our big brother down south, Australia is a member of the Pacific Islands Forum and Australia is a Pacific island, a big island, but a Pacific island." Japan and certain nations of the Malay Archipelago (including East Timor, Indonesia and the Philippines) have representation in the Pacific Islands Forum, but none are full members. The nations of the Malay Archipelago have their own regional governing organization called ASEAN, which includes mainland Southeast Asian nations such as Vietnam and Thailand. In July 2019, at the inaugural Indonesian Exposition held in Auckland, Indonesia launched its 'Pacific Elevation' program, which would encompass a new era of elevated engagement with the region, with the country also using the event to lay claim that Indonesia is culturally and ethnically linked to the Pacific islands. The event was attended by dignitaries from Australia, New Zealand and some Pacific island countries.
List of the largest Pacific islands Islands of the Pacific Ocean proper, with an area larger than 10,000 km2.
Name Area (km2) Country/Countries Population Population density Region Subregion New Guinea 785,753 Indonesia, Papua New Guinea 14,800,000 18.8 Oceania Melanesia Borneo 748,168 Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei 23,053,723 30.8 Asia Southeast Asia Honshu 227,960 Japan 103,000,000 451.8 Asia East Asia Sulawesi 174,600 Indonesia 18,455,000 105.7 Asia Southeast Asia South Island 150,437 New Zealand 1,201,300 7.5 Oceania Australasia / Polynesia North Island 113,729 New Zealand 4,749,200 33.0 Oceania Australasia / Polynesia Luzon 109,965 Philippines 48,520,000 441.2 Asia Southeast Asia Mindanao 104,530 Philippines 25,281,000 241.9 Asia Southeast Asia Hokkaido 77,981 Japan 5,474,000 70.2 Asia East Asia Sakhalin 72,493 Russia 580,000 8.0 Asia North Asia Tasmania 64,519 Australia 514,700 5.7 Oceania Australasia Taiwan Island (Formosa) 35,883 Taiwan 23,000,000 641.0 Asia East Asia Kyushu 35,640 Japan 13,231,000 371.2 Asia East Asia New Britain 35,145 Papua New Guinea 513,926 14.6 Oceania Melanesia Hainan Island 33,210 China 8,180,000 246.3 Asia East Asia Vancouver Island 31,285 Canada 759,366 24.2 North America Northern America Shikoku 18,800 Japan 4,141,955 220.3 Asia East Asia Grande Terre 16,648 New Caledonia (France) 208,709 12.5 Oceania Melanesia Palawan 12,189 Philippines 430,000 35.3 Asia Southeast Asia Hawaii 10,434 United States of America 185,079 17.7 Oceania Polynesia Viti Levu 10,388 Fiji 600,000 57.0 Oceania Melanesia
By continent
Antarctica List of Antarctic and subantarctic islands
Asia List of islands of Asia List of islands of China Japanese archipelago of 6,852 islands List of islands of Japan List of islands of Indonesia List of islands of North Korea List of islands of the Philippines List of islands of Russia List of islands of South Korea List of islands of Vietnam
North America Central American Pacific Islands List of islands of North America List of islands of Canada, section British Columbia List of islands of Mexico List of islands of the United States
Oceania List of islands of Australia List of islands of Britain List of islands of the Pitcairn Islands List of islands of Fiji List of islands of France, section Pacific Ocean List of islands of Hawaii