Virtual Oceania — Your virtual guide to Oceania.
Oceania is a continental region between Asia and the Americas. The Australian mainland is the major landmass and the region also includes around 10,000 smaller islands in the Pacific. The name Oceania refers to the grouping of islands being linked by the ocean and adjacent seas rather than one single continental landmass like other continental regions. Oceania is the smallest continental region in land area and the second smallest, (after Antarctica), in population. Oceania is understood as being composed of four regions: Australasia, Polynesia, Melanesia, and Micronesia.
Australasia includes Australia and New Zealand and is by far the biggest region. To put this in perspective, New Zealand is bigger than all the other South Pacific Islands combined and New Zealand fits into Australia nearly 30 times.
New Zealand is also culturally and linguistically part of Polynesia, and is the south-western anchor of the Polynesian Triangle of which Hawaii and Easter Island make up the other points. Other countries in Polynesia include: French Polynesia, Cook Islands, Samoa, and Tuvalu.
Nearby Melanesia includes New Caledonia, Solomon Islands, New Guinea, Vanuatu, and Fiji and is culturally and racially distinct from Polynesia.
Micronesia to the north is also distinct. Island nations here includes Kiribati, Guam, Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Northern Mariana Islands, Palau, Nauru, and Wake Island.