What is the smallest continent by land area?

Australia is the smallest continent by land area. It covers approximately 7.7 million square kilometres, making it smaller than Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Antarctica, and Europe in the standard seven-continent model.

Australia is also unusual because the continent and the country share the same commonly used name. Geographically, the continent is the landmass that includes mainland Australia, Tasmania, and nearby islands. Politically, the Commonwealth of Australia includes additional territories, so geographic and political definitions do not always line up perfectly.

A frequent mix-up is Europe, which is often described as the second-smallest continent. Europe’s area is roughly 10.2 million square kilometres, so it is considerably larger than Australia. Some geographic traditions combine Europe and Asia as Eurasia or group Australia with nearby islands as Oceania; those classification systems can change the wording, but Australia remains the accepted answer to a conventional seven-continent quiz question.