Countries
Key facts
- Capital
- Harare
- Region
- Africa, Eastern Africa
- Population
- 16,950,795 (2025)
- Area
- 390,580 km²
- Currency
- Zimbabwe Gold (ZWG), Botswana pula (BWP), Chinese yuan (CNY), euro (EUR), British pound (GBP), Indian rupee (INR), Japanese yen (JPY), United States dollar (USD), South African rand (ZAR)
- Languages
- English, Shona, South Ndebele, North Ndebele
- Calling code
- +263
- Internet domain
- .zw
- ISO codes
- ZW, ZWE, 716
- Time zone
- UTC+2:00
- United Nations
- Member state
Land and position
Zimbabwe covers about 390,580 square kilometres. By area it ranks 62nd among the 250 countries and territories on this site. It is a little smaller than Paraguay and a little larger than Japan. It shares a land border with 4 neighbours: Botswana, Mozambique, South Africa, Zambia. It is landlocked, which means it has no sea coast. Its centre lies at about 20° south, 30° east, in the southern hemisphere.
Neighbours
People
About 17 million people live in Zimbabwe (World Bank, 2025). That makes it the 74th most populous of the 246 places on this site with a figure, with about 0.21 percent of the world's people. On average there are 43 people to each square kilometre. About 40 percent of people live in towns and cities (World Bank, 2025). A baby born there can expect to live about 63 years (World Bank, 2024). Languages listed for it: English, Shona, South Ndebele, North Ndebele. A person from Zimbabwe is called Zimbabwean.
Money and economy
The currency is the Zimbabwe Gold (code ZWG, symbol ZiG). Also listed as used here: Botswana pula (BWP), Chinese yuan (CNY), euro (EUR), British pound (GBP), Indian rupee (INR), Japanese yen (JPY), United States dollar (USD), South African rand (ZAR). The World Bank puts the size of its economy (GDP) at about US$ 51.2 billion (2025), which is about US$ 3,021 for each person (2025).
Time
Zimbabwe uses one time zone, UTC+2:00 (Africa/Harare). Clocks stay the same all year: there is no daylight saving time.
Time now: loading
Offsets are for January 2026. See Time Zones for a converter.
Largest cities
| City | People |
|---|---|
| Harare | 1,542,813 |
| Bulawayo | 665,952 |
| Chitungwiza | 371,246 |
| Mutare | 224,802 |
| Gweru | 158,200 |
| Kwekwe | 119,863 |
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 Eastern Africa
British Indian Ocean Territory, Burundi, Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar. 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.