Kiribati includes Kiritimati, one of the world’s earliest inhabited places to enter a new year.
Kiritimati, also known as Christmas Island, is part of Kiribati and lies in the Line Islands. The islands use UTC+14, the world’s most advanced civil time zone, so their clocks reach midnight before those in most other inhabited locations. This makes Kiritimati a frequent subject of New Year time-zone explanations.
The result follows from the International Date Line’s unusual route through the Pacific. Kiribati moved the date line for its eastern islands in 1994, allowing the country’s territory to share the same calendar day. Before the change, the country was divided by the date line and could experience different dates at the same time.
“First country” headlines can oversimplify the issue because the exact order depends on time zones, territories, and whether one is comparing countries, islands, or settlements. Kiribati is the country associated with Kiritimati’s early midnight, not Samoa or Tonga.