What is the biggest island in Canada?

The biggest island in Canada is Baffin Island.

Baffin Island lies in Nunavut, in Canada’s eastern Arctic, between the Arctic Ocean and the Labrador Sea. With an area of about 507,451 square kilometres, it is larger than many countries and is the fifth-largest island in the world. Its Inuktitut name, Qikiqtaaluk, is commonly translated as “very big island.”

The island is home to Iqaluit, the capital of Nunavut, on the southern shore of Frobisher Bay. Much of Baffin Island is mountainous, glaciated, and sparsely populated. Inuit communities have lived in the region for thousands of years, and Inuit culture remains central to the island’s identity.

A common mix-up is Newfoundland, which is Canada’s largest island outside the Arctic. Newfoundland is also far more densely populated, but it is only about one-fifth the area of Baffin Island. Baffin is named after English explorer William Baffin, who encountered it during a 1616 voyage connected with the search for the Northwest Passage. Norse explorers may have known the region as Helluland, or “stone land.”