Papua's Total Size & Land Area: rank & territory types

Papua New Guinea's land area is 174,850 sq mi, and the total size is 178,704 sq mi, with inland water included. Papua New Guinea rankes 53/197 by total surface area.

Occupies 0.3% of the land mass of all countries.
3.1% of its territory is agricultural land.
Papua has 0.03% of the world's agricultural land area.
79% of its area is covered by forests.
Has 0.89% of the world's forests.

Papua New Guinea total size and land area

	Papua New Guinea	Rank
Total surface area	178,704 sq mi	53/197
Share all of all countries' surface area	0.09%	N/A
Land area	174,850 sq mi	54/197
Share of all countries' land area	0.3%	N/A
Population	10,576,502	92/197
Population density	62.6 ppl/mi²	165/197

Papua New Guinea's True Size on the Map

Drag Papua New Guinea across the map to see how the Mercator projection distorts its apparent size at different latitudes. Add more countries to compare.

Papua New Guinea's area by type

	Papua New Guinea	Rank
Forest area	138,051 sq mi	19/196
Forest area as share of land	79%	7/196
World's forests share	0.89%	N/A
Agricultural land	5,425 sq mi	132/194
Agricultural land share	3.1%	189/194
Share of global agricultural land	0.03%	N/A
Arable land	1,274 sq mi	134/191
Arable land share	0.73%	180/191
Permanent cropland	3,417 sq mi	40/192
Permanent cropland share	1.95%	88/192
Water area	3,853 sq mi	47/197
Water as share of total area	2.16%	75/197
Roads length	5,809 mi	121/176
Land borders length	512 mi	126/197
Coastline length	3,201 mi	22/197
Share of marine protected waters	0.1%	134/155

Papua New Guinea's size on the map

Data sources: World Bank | Agriculture & Rural Development (2026, retrieved 2026-04-06).

GeoRank.org/size/papua-new-guinea | CC BY

The map above outlines the borders of Papua New Guinea but is not accurate for size comparison because it's a 2d map with Mercator projection that distorts territories near the poles. The farther a country is from the equator, the more magnified it appears. More about country size projections.