Tasmania is an island state of Australia. It is located 240 kilometres (150 miles) to the south of the Australian mainland, separated from it by the Bass Strait, with the archipelago containing the southernmost point of the country. The state encompasses the main island of Tasmania, the 26th-largest island in the world, and the surrounding 1000 islands. It is Australia's least populous state, with 569,825 residents as of December 2021. The state capital and largest city is Hobart, with around 40 percent of the population living in the Greater Hobart area. Tasmania is the most decentralised state in Australia, with the lowest proportion of its residents living within its capital city.
Tasmania from space
Tessellated pavement, a rare rock formation on the Tasman Peninsula
1807 engraving by French explorer Charles Alexandre Lesueur shows seafaring Aboriginal people and a large canoe on the eastern shore of Schouten Island.
Tasmania is named after Dutch explorer Abel Tasman, the first European to sight the island, in 1642.
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. Australia is the largest country by area in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, tropical savannas in the north, and mountain ranges in the south-east.
Aboriginal rock art in the Kimberley region of Western Australia
Landing of James Cook at Botany Bay on 29 April 1770 to claim Australia's east coast for Great Britain
Tasmania's Port Arthur penal settlement is one of eleven UNESCO World Heritage-listed Australian Convict Sites.
The Big Picture, a painting by Tom Roberts, depicts the opening of the first Australian Parliament in 1901.