Countries
Key facts
- Capital
- London
- Region
- Europe, Northern Europe
- Population
- 69,487,000 (2025)
- Area
- 244,820 km²
- Currency
- British pound (GBP)
- Languages
- English, Welsh, Scottish Gaelic
- Calling code
- +44
- Internet domain
- .uk
- ISO codes
- GB, GBR, 826
- Time zone
- UTC
- United Nations
- Member state
- Postal code pattern
- @# #@@|@## #@@|@@# #@@|@@## #@@|@#@ #@@|@@#@ #@@|GIR0AA (# = digit, @ = letter)
Land and position
The United Kingdom covers about 244,820 square kilometres. By area it ranks 81st among the 250 countries and territories on this site. It is a little smaller than Guinea and a little larger than Ghana. It shares a land border with 1 neighbour: Ireland. Its centre lies at about 54° north, 2° west, in the northern hemisphere.
Neighbours
People
About 69.5 million people live in the United Kingdom (World Bank, 2025). That makes it the 22nd most populous of the 246 places on this site with a figure, with about 0.85 percent of the world's people. On average there are 284 people to each square kilometre. About 83 percent of people live in towns and cities (World Bank, 2025). A baby born there can expect to live about 81 years (World Bank, 2024). Languages listed for it: English, Welsh, Scottish Gaelic. A person from the United Kingdom is called British.
Money and economy
The currency is the British pound (code GBP, symbol £). It is also the main currency of Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey. The World Bank puts the size of its economy (GDP) at about US$ 4 trillion (2025), which is about US$ 57,602 for each person (2025).
Time
The United Kingdom uses one time zone, UTC (Europe/London). Clocks are moved for daylight saving time in part of the year.
Time now: loading
Offsets are for January 2026. See Time Zones for a converter.
Largest cities
| City | People |
|---|---|
| London | 8,961,989 |
| Birmingham | 1,157,603 |
| Glasgow | 626,410 |
| Manchester | 568,996 |
| Sheffield | 556,500 |
| Leeds | 536,280 |
City figures are from GeoNames and count the city itself, not the wider urban area. They can be some years old, so use them to see the order of size.
More in Northern Europe
Denmark, Estonia, Faroe Islands, Finland, Guernsey, Iceland, Isle of Man, Jersey. See the whole region.
Figures were collected on 11 November 2026 from the World Bank, GeoNames and the open countries data set. See About and data sources. Borders and names follow those sources and do not express any view on disputed territory.