Kiribati’s Line Islands are among the first inhabited places to celebrate New Year’s Eve.
The islands use UTC+14, the world’s most advanced standard time zone. As a result, midnight arrives there before it reaches most other inhabited locations, including nearby Pacific island groups that use earlier offsets.
Kiribati moved the International Date Line eastward around its territory in 1995. This change placed the Phoenix and Line island groups on the same calendar day as the rest of the country, avoiding a situation in which different parts of Kiribati were separated by a date line.
Kiritimati, also called Christmas Island, is the best-known inhabited island in the Line Islands. It should not be confused with Australia’s Christmas Island, which is a different island in the Indian Ocean.