Which mountain is the highest point above sea level?

Mount Everest is the highest point above sea level.

Its summit is 8,848.86 metres above sea level according to the height announced jointly by Nepal and China in 2020. Everest stands in the Himalayas on the border between Nepal and Tibet, an autonomous region of China. In Nepal it is called Sagarmatha; in Tibet it is known as Chomolungma.

The mountain was named in the nineteenth century after George Everest, a former Surveyor General of India. The name was adopted despite Everest’s own preference for a local name. Edmund Hillary of New Zealand and Tenzing Norgay of Nepal made the first confirmed successful ascent on 29 May 1953.

Everest is the highest mountain above sea level, but not the mountain whose summit is farthest from Earth’s centre. Because Earth bulges at the equator, the summit of Ecuador’s Chimborazo is farther from the planet’s centre. K2 is the world’s second-highest mountain above sea level.