Australia is the planet's sixth largest country after Russia, Canada, China, the USA, and Brazil. At 7 688 287km2, it accounts for just five percent of the world's land area of 149450000km2, and although it is the smallest continental land mass, it is the world's largest island.
For more information visit The World Factbook.
Calculations on Australia's area are based on the coastline data as explained in Geoscience Australia's GEODATA Coast 100K2004 page. The coastline data is nationally uniform, is sourced primarily from the 1:100000 scale National Topographic Map Series and is the most authoritative data source currently available to calculate the area of Australia.
