States and territories of Australia, matched to countries
Natural Earth’s file divides Australia into 8 states and territories. Below, each is drawn at true scale and matched to the country closest to it in area and in population.
Australia has 6 states and 2 internal territories with a place in ISO 3166-2; all 8 are counted here. The external territories, such as Norfolk Island and the Coral Sea Islands, are separate places on this site. Three small features that Natural Earth draws beside the states are left out: Jervis Bay Territory, Macquarie Island and Lord Howe Island.
Population: the 2024 figures Wikidata holds, for 7 of the 8 states and territories. The only figure it has for Tasmania (Australia) (2020) is a different year, and it is shown with that year. Every population on these pages carries its year; they are not one count taken on one day.
At a glance
- Western Australia, the largest, is 1,076× the size of Australian Capital Territory, the smallest.
- The five largest, Western Australia, Queensland, Northern Territory, South Australia, New South Wales, cover 96% of Australia.
- 5 of the 8 are larger than the United Kingdom (244,000 km²).
- 5 of the 8 are larger than France (548,000 km²).
- Australian Capital Territory, the most crowded, has 205 people per km²: 1,055× Northern Territory, the least crowded (0.2).
- Half of the people counted live in the 2 most populous (New South Wales and Victoria), which cover 13% of the area; the years of the figures differ.
- 2 of the 8 have more people than the median of the 38 European countries listed here (6.6 million).
Every state or territory matched to a country
Largest first. The matches are the countries closest in area and in population from Natural Earth’s country list; contested places and dependencies are never used as matches. Population is the newest figure Wikidata holds, with its year.
- Western Australia2,528,000 km² · 3.0 million (2024)Size ofKazakhstan0.93× · 2,714,000 km²People ofArmenia1.03× · 2.9 million
- Queensland1,730,000 km² · 5.6 million (2024)Size ofLibya1.07× · 1,624,000 km²People ofNorway1.00× · 5.6 million
- Northern Territory1,348,000 km² · 262,000 (2024)Size ofPeru1.05× · 1,290,000 km²People ofVanuatu87% · 300,000
- South Australia984,000 km² · 1.9 million (2024)Size ofEgypt0.98× · 1,001,000 km²People ofGuinea-Bissau1.02× · 1.9 million
- New South Wales802,000 km² · 8.5 million (2024)Size ofMozambique1.02× · 788,000 km²People ofHonduras1.03× · 8.3 million
- Victoria228,000 km² · 7.0 million (2024)Size ofLaos1.00× · 228,000 km²People ofLaos1.02× · 6.9 million
- Tasmania (Australia)68,100 km² · 540,000 (2020)Size ofIreland0.98× · 69,400 km²People ofCape Verde0.97× · 556,000
- Australian Capital Territory2,350 km² · 482,000 (2024)Size ofLuxembourg0.90× · 2,610 km²People ofBrunei1.05× · 459,000
Too small to see on the map
At the scale of the map this unit is a few pixels wide or less, so it is ringed on the map and drawn here as discs of true relative area. Each is matched to the small countries and island nations, not to the countries of 1,000 km² and more.
- Australian Capital Territory2,350 km² · official 2,3600.90× Luxembourg2,610 km²
The closest matches in size
How crowded they are
Beside the regions of other countries
Every state or territory also has a closest match, by area and by people, among the 387 regions of the other 12 countries. All the matches, in both directions, are on one page.
Sources and method
- Outlines
- Natural Earth, 1:10m Admin 1 - States, Provinces, public domain. The 8 listed are all of the features Natural Earth has for Australia, except Jervis Bay Territory, Macquarie Island and Lord Howe Island.
- Boundary
- De facto, as drawn by Natural Earth.
- Area
- Measured on the WGS84 ellipsoid from the full-detail outlines, shown rounded. The 8 areas add up to 7,691,000 km², within 0.1% of the country’s measured area.
- Official figures
- Area, population and capital from Wikidata (CC0), fetched 2026-11-12. Population is the 2024 figure where Wikidata has it, otherwise its newest; the year is shown.
- Data built
- 2026-11-12