Kiribati is among the first countries to enter each New Year because its Line Islands use UTC+14.
The Line Islands, including Kiritimati, lie on the world’s most advanced civil time zone, 14 hours ahead of Coordinated Universal Time. As a result, midnight arrives there before it does in most inhabited places around the globe.
Kiribati moved the date line for its eastern islands in 1994, bringing the country’s territory onto the same calendar day. Before that change, the islands could be separated by a calendar date despite belonging to one country.
Claims about the “first country” can be imprecise because the order depends on which islands, territories, and inhabited locations are being compared. Kiritimati is often described as one of the first inhabited places to celebrate, while nearby Pacific states such as Tonga and Samoa also enter the year very early.