geography Geography (from Ancient Greek ; combining 'Earth' and 'write', literally 'Earth writing') is the study of the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. Geography is an all-encompassing discipline that seeks an understanding o ...

, the antipode () of any spot on

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to Planetary habitability, harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being an ocean world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all ...

is the point on Earth's surface diametrically opposite to it. A pair of points ''antipodal'' () to each other are situated such that a

straight line In geometry, a straight line, usually abbreviated line, is an infinitely long object with no width, depth, or curvature, an idealization of such physical objects as a straightedge, a taut string, or a ray of light. Lines are spaces of dimens ...

connecting the two would pass through Earth's center.

Antipodal point In mathematics, two points of a sphere (or n-sphere, including a circle) are called antipodal or diametrically opposite if they are the endpoints of a diameter, a straight line segment between two points on a sphere and passing through its cen ...

s are as far away from each other as possible. The

North North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography. Etymology T ...

and

South Pole The South Pole, also known as the Geographic South Pole or Terrestrial South Pole, is the point in the Southern Hemisphere where the Earth's rotation, Earth's axis of rotation meets its surface. It is called the True South Pole to distinguish ...

s are antipodes of each other. In the

Northern Hemisphere The Northern Hemisphere is the half of Earth that is north of the equator. For other planets in the Solar System, north is defined by humans as being in the same celestial sphere, celestial hemisphere relative to the invariable plane of the Solar ...

, "the Antipodes" may refer to

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

and

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

, and Antipodeans to their inhabitants. Geographically, the antipodes of the British Isles are in the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...

, south of New Zealand. This gave rise to the name of the

Antipodes Islands The Antipodes Islands (, ) are inhospitable and uninhabited volcanic islands in subantarctic waters to the south of – and territorially part of – New Zealand. The archipelago lies to the southeast of Stewart Island / Rakiura, and to the ...

of New Zealand, which are close to the antipode of

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

. The antipodes of

are in the

North Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the Age of Discovery, it was known for se ...

, while parts of

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. Featuring Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe, Portugal borders Spain to its north and east, with which it share ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

and

Morocco Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...

are antipodal to New Zealand. Approximately 15% of land territory is antipodal to other land, representing approximately 4.4% of Earth's surface. Another source estimates that about 3% of Earth's surface is antipodal land. The largest antipodal land masses are the

Malay Archipelago The Malay Archipelago is the archipelago between Mainland Southeast Asia and Australia, and is also called Insulindia or the Indo-Australian Archipelago. The name was taken from the 19th-century European concept of a Malay race, later based ...

, antipodal to the

Amazon basin The Amazon basin is the part of South America drained by the Amazon River and its tributary, tributaries. The Amazon drainage basin covers an area of about , or about 35.5 percent of the South American continent. It is located in the countries ...

and adjoining

Andean The Andes ( ), Andes Mountains or Andean Mountain Range (; ) are the longest continental mountain range in the world, forming a continuous highland along the western edge of South America. The range is long and wide (widest between 18°S ...

ranges; east

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

and

Mongolia Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south and southeast. It covers an area of , with a population of 3.5 million, making it the world's List of countries and dependencies by po ...

, and small sections of southeast

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

, antipodal to

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

and

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...

; and

Greenland Greenland is an autonomous territory in the Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark. It is by far the largest geographically of three constituent parts of the kingdom; the other two are metropolitan Denmark and the Faroe Islands. Citizens of Greenlan ...

and the

Canadian Arctic Archipelago The Arctic Archipelago, also known as the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, is an archipelago lying to the north of the Canadian continental mainland, excluding Greenland (an autonomous territory of the Danish Realm, which is, by itself, much larger ...

, antipodal to

East Antarctica East Antarctica, also called Greater Antarctica, constitutes the majority (two-thirds) of the Antarctic continent, lying primarily in the Eastern Hemisphere south of the Indian Ocean, and separated from West Antarctica by the Transantarctic ...

. There is a general paucity of antipodal land because the Southern Hemisphere has comparatively less land than the Northern Hemisphere and, of that, the antipodes of Australia are in the

, while the antipodes of southern

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

are in the

North Pacific Ocean North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography. Etymology The word ''north'' ...

Geography

Since the antipode of any place on the Earth is the place that is diametrically opposite of it, a line drawn from one to the other will pass through the centre of Earth and form a true

diameter In geometry, a diameter of a circle is any straight line segment that passes through the centre of the circle and whose endpoints lie on the circle. It can also be defined as the longest Chord (geometry), chord of the circle. Both definitions a ...

. For example, the antipodes of New Zealand's lower North Island lie in Spain. Most of the Earth's land surfaces have ocean at their antipodes; this is a natural consequence of most of the Earth's surface being covered in water. The antipode of any place on Earth is distant from it by 180° of

longitude Longitude (, ) is a geographic coordinate that specifies the east- west position of a point on the surface of the Earth, or another celestial body. It is an angular measurement, usually expressed in degrees and denoted by the Greek lett ...

and as many degrees to the north of the

Equator The equator is the circle of latitude that divides Earth into the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Southern Hemisphere, Southern Hemispheres of Earth, hemispheres. It is an imaginary line located at 0 degrees latitude, about in circumferen ...

as the original is to the south (or vice versa); in other words, the

latitude In geography, latitude is a geographic coordinate system, geographic coordinate that specifies the north-south position of a point on the surface of the Earth or another celestial body. Latitude is given as an angle that ranges from −90° at t ...

s are numerically equal, but one is north and the other south. The maps shown here are based on this relationship; they show a

Lambert azimuthal equal-area projection The Lambert azimuthal equal-area projection is a particular mapping from a sphere to a disk. It accurately represents area in all regions of the sphere, but it does not accurately represent angles. It is named for the Swiss mathematician Johann ...

of the Earth, in yellow, overlaid on which is another map, in blue, shifted horizontally by 180° of longitude and inverted about the Equator with respect to latitude.

Solar noon Noon (also known as noontime or midday) is 12 o'clock in the daytime. It is written as 12 noon, 12:00 m. (for '' meridiem'', literally 12:00 midday), 12 p.m. (for ''post meridiem'', literally "after midday"), 12 pm, or 12:00 (using a 24-hour clo ...

(i.e. the time at which the sun is highest) at one place is solar midnight at the other, the

winter solstice The winter solstice, or hibernal solstice, occurs when either of Earth's geographical pole, poles reaches its maximum axial tilt, tilt away from the Sun. This happens twice yearly, once in each hemisphere (Northern Hemisphere, Northern and So ...

at one place is the

summer solstice The summer solstice or estival solstice occurs when one of Earth's poles has its maximum tilt toward the Sun. It happens twice yearly, once in each hemisphere ( Northern and Southern). The summer solstice is the day with the longest peri ...

at the other, and the spring equinox at one place is the fall equinox at the other. Sunrise and sunset do not quite oppose each other at antipodes due to refraction of sunlight.

Mathematical description

If the

geographic coordinate A geographic coordinate system (GCS) is a spherical or geodetic coordinate system for measuring and communicating positions directly on Earth as latitude and longitude. It is the simplest, oldest, and most widely used type of the various ...

s (

and

) of a point on the Earth's surface are (''φ'', ''θ''), then the coordinates of the antipodal point are (−''φ'', ''θ'' ± 180°). This relation holds true whether the Earth is approximated as a perfect

sphere A sphere (from Ancient Greek, Greek , ) is a surface (mathematics), surface analogous to the circle, a curve. In solid geometry, a sphere is the Locus (mathematics), set of points that are all at the same distance from a given point in three ...

or as a

reference ellipsoid An Earth ellipsoid or Earth spheroid is a mathematical figure approximating the Earth's form, used as a reference frame for computations in geodesy, astronomy, and the geosciences. Various different ellipsoids have been used as approximation ...

. In terms of the usual way these geographic coordinates are given, this

transformation Transformation may refer to: Science and mathematics In biology and medicine * Metamorphosis, the biological process of changing physical form after birth or hatching * Malignant transformation, the process of cells becoming cancerous * Trans ...

can be expressed symbolically as :''x''° N/S ''y''° E/W ↦ ''x''° S/N (180 − ''y'')° W/E, that is, for the latitude (the north–south coordinate) the magnitude of the angle remains the same but N is changed to S and vice versa, and for the longitude (the East/West coordinate) the angle is replaced by its

supplementary angle In Euclidean geometry, an angle can refer to a number of concepts relating to the intersection of two straight lines at a point. Formally, an angle is a figure lying in a plane formed by two rays, called the '' sides'' of the angle, sharing ...

while E is exchanged for W. For example, the antipode of the point in China at (a few hundred kilometres from

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

) is the point in Argentina at (a few hundred kilometres from

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires, controlled by the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Argentina. It is located on the southwest of the Río de la Plata. Buenos Aires is classified as an Alpha− glob ...

Etymology

The word ''antipodes'' comes from the Greek: ἀντίποδες (antípodes), plural of ἀντίπους (antipous), "with feet opposite (ours)", from ἀντί (antí, “opposite”) + πούς ( poús, “foot”). The Greek word is attested in

Plato Plato ( ; Greek language, Greek: , ; born BC, died 348/347 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Classical Greece, Classical period who is considered a foundational thinker in Western philosophy and an innovator of the writte ...

's dialogue '' Timaeus'', already referring to a spherical Earth, explaining the relativity of the terms "above" and "below": The term is taken up by

Aristotle Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...

(''De caelo'' 308a.20),

Strabo Strabo''Strabo'' (meaning "squinty", as in strabismus) was a term employed by the Romans for anyone whose eyes were distorted or deformed. The father of Pompey was called "Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo, Pompeius Strabo". A native of Sicily so clear-si ...

(''

Geographica The ''Geographica'' (, ''Geōgraphiká''; or , "Strabo's 17 Books on Geographical Topics") or ''Geography'', is an encyclopedia of geographical knowledge, consisting of 17 'books', written in Greek in the late 1st century BC, or early 1st cen ...

'' 1.1.13),

Plutarch Plutarch (; , ''Ploútarchos'', ; – 120s) was a Greek Middle Platonist philosopher, historian, biographer, essayist, and priest at the Temple of Apollo (Delphi), Temple of Apollo in Delphi. He is known primarily for his ''Parallel Lives'', ...

(''

On the Malice of Herodotus ''On the Malice of Herodotus'' or ''On the Malignity of Herodotus'' () is an essay by Plutarch criticizing the historian Herodotus for all manner of prejudice and misrepresentation in the latter's '' Histories''. It has been called "the first boo ...

'' 37) and Diogenes Laërtius (''Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers'' book 3), and was adopted into Latin as ''antipodes''. The Latin word changed its sense from the original "under the feet, opposite side" to "those with the feet opposite", i.e. a bahuvrihi referring to hypothetical people living on the opposite side of the Earth. Medieval illustrations imagine them in some way "inverted", with their feet growing out of their heads, pointing upward. In this sense, ''Antipodes'' first entered English language, English in 1398 in a translation of the 13th century ''De Proprietatibus Rerum'' by Bartholomeus Anglicus, translated by John of Trevisa: (''In Modern English: Yonder in Ethiopia are the Antipodes, men that have their feet against our feet.'') The modern English singular ''antipode'' arose in the 16th or 17th century as a back-formation from ''antipodes''; ''antipous'' or the Latinate ''antipus'' would have been closer to the original singular. Most dictionaries suggest a pronunciation of for this form.

Historical significance

Pomponius Mela, the first Roman geographer, asserted that the earth had two habitable zones, a North and South one, but that it would be impossible to get into contact with each other because of Torrid zone, the unbearable heat at the Equator (''De orbis situ'' 1.4). Crates Terrestrial Sphere

Third-century AD Christian philosopher Augustine of Hippo was skeptical of the notion. Augustine asserted that "it is too absurd to say that some men might have set sail from this side and, traversing the immense expanse of ocean, have propagated there a race of human beings descended from that one first man." In the Early Middle Ages, Isidore of Seville's widely read Etymologiae, encyclopedia presented the term "antipodes" or, as he said "antipodas" as referring to antichthones (people who lived on the opposite side of the Earth), as well as to a geographical place: In using the form ''antipodas'' rather than the more usual Latin ''antipodes'' Isidore simply transcribed the original Greek αντίποδας, the singular case of the name: the plural case is αντίποδες (antipodes), used in converting the name into Latin. These people came to play a role in medieval discussions about the Flat earth#Europe: Early Middle Ages, shape of the Earth. In 748, in reply to a letter from Saint Boniface, Boniface, Pope Zachary declared the belief "that beneath the earth there was another world and other men, another sun and moon" to be heretical. In his letter, Boniface had apparently maintained that Vergilius of Salzburg held such a belief. The antipodes being an attribute of a spherical Earth, some ancient authors used their perceived absurdity as an argument for a flat Earth. However, knowledge of the spherical Earth was widespread during the Middle Ages, only occasionally disputed—the medieval dispute surrounding the antipodes mainly concerned the question whether people could live on the opposite side of the earth: since the torrid clime was considered impassable, it would have been impossible to evangelize them. This posed the problem that Christ told the apostles to evangelize all mankind; with regard to the unreachable antipodes, this would have been impossible. Christ would either have appeared a second time, in the antipodes, or left the damned irredeemable. Such an argument was forwarded by the Spanish theologian Alonso Tostado as late as the 15th century and "St. Augustine doubts" was a response to Columbus's proposal to sail westwards to the Indies. The author of the Norwegian book ''Konungs Skuggsjá'', from around 1250, discusses the existence of antipodes. He notes that (if they exist) they will see the sun in the north in the middle of the day and that they will have seasons opposite those of the Northern Hemisphere. Herodotus recorded that Pharaoh Necho II of the 26th Dynasty (610–595 BC) commissioned an expedition of Phoenicians which in three years sailed from the Red Sea around Africa back to the mouth of the Nile, and that "''as they sailed on a westerly course round the southern end of Libya (Africa), they had the sun on their right''"— to northward of them, proving that they had been in the Southern Hemisphere. The earliest surviving account by a European who had visited the Southern Hemisphere is that of Marco Polo (who, on his way home in 1292, sailed south of the Malay Peninsula). He noted that it was impossible to see the star Polaris from there. The idea of dry land in the southern climes, the ''Terra Australis'', was introduced by Ptolemy and appears on European maps as an imaginary continent from the 15th century. ''Antipodes'' was what Giovanni Matteo Contarini, Giovanni Contarini, on his world map of 1506 called the land later named ''America'' by Martin Waldseemüller. When the land discovered by Pedro Alvarez Cabral in April 1500, Brazil, was formally named ''Santa Cruz'' by the assembled Portuguese court on 20 May 1503, it was also referred to in the official record of the proceedings as the “Land of the Antipodes”: ''terra Antipodum''. The land reached by Columbus in 1492 was identified as that of the Antipodes by the diplomatist Peter Martyr who, in a letter he wrote from Barcelona dated 14 May 1493, said: "A few days since, a certain Christopher Columbus, a Ligurian, returned from the Western Antipodes". Perhaps influenced by this, Fernão Vaz Dourado in his Atlas of 1571 inscribed over the map of Mexico and adjacent parts of America, ''Tera Antipodum regis Castelle inventa a Xforo Columbo Januensi'' (Land of the Antipodes, discovered for the King of Castile by Christopher Columbus of Genoa). In spite of having been discovered relatively late by European explorers,

was inhabited very early in human history; the ancestors of the Indigenous Australians reached it at least 50,000 years ago.

True trip "around the world"

To make the longest distance trip around the planet, a traveler would have to pass through a set of antipodal points. ''All meridians'' can be crossed in one hemisphere—indeed, this is possible by walking in a circle around one of the poles—but such trips are shorter than a minimum circumnavigation. On the other hand, the greatest straight line distance that could in theory be covered is a trip exactly on the Equator, a distance of . The Earth's equatorial bulge makes this slightly longer than a north–south trip around the world along a set of meridian lines, which is a distance of . Any other closed great circle route starting on the equator and traveling at an angle between 0° (an equatorial route) and 90° (a polar route) would be between . In all of these cases, after half of the world has been traversed, every subsequent point will be antipodal to one already visited.

Air travel between antipodes

Non-stop antipodal flights by commercial aircraft (scheduled)

There are currently no commercial aircraft capable of traveling non-stop between antipodes with a standard full commercial passenger load. The current world record-holder Airbus A350 XWB#A350-900ULR, Airbus A350-900ULR is capable of flying , or roughly 90% of an average antipodal distance. Singapore Airlines currently holds the world record for the Longest flights, longest scheduled passenger flight, and utilizes this model in their non-stop Singapore to New York-JFK route SQ23/24. In 2019, Qantas completed separate non-stop flights taking 19–20 hours to encompass the 16,013 km (9950 miles) from New York and 17,016 km (10,573 miles) from London, both to Sydney, Australia with a limit of 49 passengers on the Boeing 787 Dreamliner and who underwent medical tests on the flight. The Kangaroo Route, London-Sydney direct routes are said to be the world's most profitable ultra long-haul, ultra-long haul flights annually. Their plans for the same pair of experiments were quickly put on hold due to global travel restrictions throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

Non-stop antipodal flights by commercial aircraft (chartered)

In March 2021, a Comlux Boeing 787 Dreamliner, 787-8, registered P4-787, flew a non-scheduled (chartered), non-stop flight from Incheon International Airport, Seoul Incheon to Ministro Pistarini International Airport, Buenos Aires, which are nearly antipodal points. This set a new record for the longest commercial non-stop flight with paying passengers, covering in 20 hours 19 minutes. The business jet variant of the Airbus A350, the Airbus A350#ACJ350, ACJ350, which entered into service in 2020, has a range of 20,550 km (12,770 miles), enabling it to operate between any two available antipodes. there are three ACJ350s now in service globally. The owner of the first ACJ350, the German Government, has already taken it on a close to antipodal flight with a flight from Cologne, Germany to Canberra, Australia in November 2020. The upcoming Boeing business jet variant, the Boeing 777X#BBJ 777X, BBJ 777-8, will also have an antipodal reach with its published range of 21,570 km (13,403 miles). Both aforementioned variants from Airbus and Boeing are the first aircraft designed to handle flights exceeding the Earth's average antipodal distance of 20,000 km (12,420 miles).

Direct flights

Among flights with fuel stop and crew-change stop but still same flight number, Air New Zealand previously had the world's longest active plane route—the Auckland–Los Angeles–

marathon, at over Los Angeles (directly )—until the airline cancelled this route late in 2019. Longest flights#Direct flights with stops, The current record holder for such a flight is co-owned by Qantas and British Airways in their operating of the Kangaroo Route's Sydney—Singapore—London flights covering a great circle distance of .

Future theoretical antipodal routes

A hypothetically almost perfect antipodal flight would be Tangier Ibn Battouta Airport,

(IATA: TNG), to Whangarei Aerodrome,

(IATA: WRE), whose designated locators are apart, almost the maximum possible distance. However, with only a length of , Whangarei's runway is too short to accommodate any current () commercial jet airliner, especially one with the required range. Traveling between them would currently need at least two plane changes. Other near-antipodal major city pairs include: * Hamilton, Bermuda and Perth: apart * Taipei and Asunción: apart * Santiago and Xi'an: apart * Madrid and Wellington: apart * Tangier and Auckland: apart * Jakarta and Bogotá: apart * Quito and Kuala Lumpur: apart *

and Shanghai: apart * Hanoi and La Paz: apart * Johannesburg and Honolulu: apart The ambiguous airport designation HLA (disambiguation), HLA could refer to either Lanseria International Airport (IATA airport code, IATA: HLA, ICAO airport code, ICAO: FALA, 25°56′S 027°55′E) in South Africa or Huslia Airport (IATA airport code, IATA: HSL, ICAO airport code, ICAO: PAHL, Federal Aviation Administration, FAA Location identifier, LID: HLA, 65°42′N 156°21′W) in Alaska. While these airports are not quite antipodal (only apart), they are notable considering that they share the same designation. Automated systems that select the wrong airport from a database could lead to navigation errors or large outliers in data analysis.

List of antipodes

Earth

Around 71% of the Earth's surface is covered by oceans, and seven-eighths of the Earth's land (when excluding Antarctica) is confined to the Land and water hemispheres, land hemisphere, so the majority of locations on land do not have land-based antipodes. About 15% of the earth's land has an antipode on land. Rough calculation shows that, of the 29% of the earth that is covered by land, if 15% of that has antipodes on land, then about 4% (0.15 × 29% = 4.35%) of the earth's surface has antipodes that are both land surfaces. Athelstan Spilhaus, Spilhaus estimates this at about 3%. The two largest human-inhabited antipodal areas are located in East Asia (mainly eastern China) and South America (mainly Argentina and Chile). The two largest monolithic antipodal land areas are most of Chile and Argentina along with eastern and central China and Mongolia, and most of Greenland along with a part of Antarctica. The Australian mainland is the largest landmass with its antipodes entirely in ocean, although some locations of mainland Australia and Tasmania are close to being antipodes of islands (Bermuda, Azores, Puerto Rico) in the North Atlantic Ocean. The largest landmass with antipodes entirely on land is the island of Borneo, whose antipodes are in the Amazon rainforest.

Cities

Exact or almost exact antipodes: * Christchurch (

) – A Coruña (

) * Levin, New Zealand, Levin (

) – Ávila, Spain, Ávila (

) * Hamilton, New Zealand, Hamilton (

) – Córdoba, Spain, Córdoba (

) * Santa Vitória do Palmar (Brazil) – Jeju City, Jeju (South Korea) * Torres, Rio Grande do Sul, Torres (Brazil) – Toshima, Kagoshima (Japan) * Barra do Quaraí (Brazil) – Zhoushan (

) * Hong Kong – La Quiaca (

) * Lianyungang (

) – Junín, Buenos Aires, Junín (

) * Madrid (

) – Weber, New Zealand, Weber (

) * Mangawhai (

) – Rock of Gibraltar (British Overseas Territories, British overseas territory) * Masterton (

) – Segovia (

) * Nelson, New Zealand, Nelson (

) – Mogadouro (

) * Padang, Indonesia, Padang (Indonesia) – Esmeraldas, Ecuador, Esmeraldas (Ecuador) * Palembang (Indonesia) – Neiva (Colombia) * Pekanbaru (Indonesia) – Machachi (Ecuador) * Tauranga, New Zealand, Tauranga (

) – Jaén, Spain, Jaén (

) * Ulan Ude (

) – Puerto Natales (

) * Wellington (capital of

) – Alaejos (Province of Valladolid, Valladolid,

) * Whangarei, New Zealand, Whangarei (

) – Tangier, Morocco, Tangier (

) * Wuhai (

) – Valdivia, Chile, Valdivia (

) * Wuhu (

) – Rafaela (

) * Yueyang (

) – La Rioja, Argentina, La Rioja (

) Ranking by the population of the smaller city, largest pairs of antipodes are Palembang (1.7m) and Neiva (360K), Christchurch (390K) and A Coruña (245K), Yueyang (1.3m) and La Rioja (210K). To within , with at least one major city (population of at least 1 million): * Auckland (

) – Seville and Málaga (Andalusia,

) *

(

) – Bahía Blanca (

) * Nanjing (

) – Rosario (

) * Shanghai (

) – Salto, Uruguay, Salto (Uruguay) * Taipei (Taiwan) – Asunción (Paraguay) * Tianjin (

) – Bahía Blanca (

) * Xi'an (

) – Santiago, or more precisely Rancagua or San Bernardo, Chile, San Bernardo (

) Taiwan (formerly called Formosa) is partly antipodal to the province of Formosa Province, Formosa in

. Capital cities within of each other's antipodes: * Taipei (Taiwan) – Asunción (Paraguay), ~ * Madrid (

) – Wellington (

), ~ * Bogotá (Colombia) – Jakarta (Indonesia), ~ Other major cities or capitals close to being antipodes: * Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) – Tokyo (Japan); the host cities of successive Summer Olympic Games (2016 Summer Olympics, 2016 and 2020 Summer Olympics, 2020), ~ *

(

) –

(

); both cities have populations in the millions, and have been town twinning, twinned since 1983, ~ * Shanghai (

) –

(

); Buenos Aires is actually closer (~) to the antipode of Shanghai (Salto, Uruguay, Salto, Uruguay) than to the antipode of Beijing (Bahía Blanca) * Tongchuan, Shaanxi, Tongchuan (

) – Licantén (

) * Guayaquil (Ecuador) – Medan (Indonesia), ~ * Phnom Penh (Cambodia) – Lima (Peru), ~ * Dili (Timor-Leste) – Paramaribo (Suriname), ~ * Irkutsk (

) – Punta Arenas (

) * Suva (Fiji) – Timbuktu (Mali) * Melbourne and Canberra (

) – Azores, Atlantic Ocean (

) * Cherbourg-en-Cotentin (

) –

(

) * Pago Pago (American Samoa) – Zinder (Niger) * Barranquilla (Colombia) – Christmas Island (

) * Doha (Qatar) – Pitcairn Island (British Overseas Territories, British overseas territory) * Hué and Da Nang (Vietnam) – Arequipa (Peru) * Manila (Philippines) – Cuiabá (Brazil) * Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) – Cuenca, Ecuador, Cuenca (Ecuador) * San Juan (PR), San Juan (Puerto Rico) – Karratha (

) * Limerick (Ireland) – Campbell Islands (

) * Arrecife, Lanzarote (Canary Islands) – Norfolk Island * Sharm el Sheikh (Egypt) – Rapa Iti (French Polynesia) * Bangkok (Thailand) – Lima (Peru) * Quito (Ecuador) – Singapore * Perth, Western Australia, Perth (

) – Hamilton, Bermuda, Hamilton (Bermuda) * Montevideo (Uruguay) – Gwangju (South Korea)

Cities and geographic features

Gibraltar is approximately antipodal to Te Arai - about north of Auckland,

. This illustrates the old yet correct saying that the The empire on which the sun never sets, sun never sets on the British Empire; the sun still does not set on the Commonwealth of Nations. The northern part of New Caledonia, an overseas territory of France, is antipodal to some thinly populated desert in Mauritania, a part of the former French West Africa. Portions of Suriname, a former Dutch colony, are antipodal to Sulawesi, an Indonesian island spelled ''Celebes'' when it was part of the Netherlands East Indies. Luzon, the largest island of the Philippines, is antipodal to eastern Bolivia. Santa Vitória do Palmar, the most southerly town of more than 10,000 people in Brazil, is antipodal to Jeju Island, the southernmost territory of South Korea. Hawaii is antipodal to parts of Botswana. The Hawaii (island), Big Island of Hawaii is antipodal to the Okavango Delta in Botswana, with the island's largest city, Hilo, antipodal to Nxai Pan National Park. Desolate Kerguelen Island is antipodal to an area of thinly inhabited plains on the border between Cypress County, Alberta and Saskatchewan, Canada and the US state of Montana. The only permanent settlement on Kerguelen Island, the research station Port-aux-Français, is antipodal to fields northeast of Senate, Saskatchewan. Other Canadian towns with antipodes on Kerguelen Island include: Consul, Saskatchewan, Consul, Nashlyn and Govenlock in the vicinity of Senate, and in Alberta Eagle Butte, Alberta, Eagle Butte, Elkwater, Alberta, Elkwater and Manyberries as well as the Red Coat Trail between Orion, Alberta and Etzikom. The northern part of Liberty County, Montana, especially the communities Goldstone, Montana, Goldstone, Fox Crossing and Sage Creek Colony, also have antipodes on Kerguelen Island. Île Saint-Paul, St. Paul Island and Île Amsterdam, Amsterdam Island are antipodal to thinly populated parts of the eastern part of the US state of Colorado. They are situated ca. south-south-east of Firstview, Colorado, Firstview and south-south-west of Granada, Colorado, respectively. Together with the northern part of Liberty County, Montana, they are the only three areas of the Contiguous United States with antipodes on land. The north-eastern coast of Alaska from Utqiaġvik (former Barrow) over Prudhoe Bay to the Canadian border, and the coasts of the Canadian territories of Yukon, Northwest Territories, and Nunavut, are antipodal to Antarctica. The Heard Island and McDonald Islands, an uninhabited Australian territory, is antipodal to an area in central Saskatchewan, including the towns of Leask, Saskatchewan, Leask and Shellbrook, Saskatchewan, Shellbrook. Tigres Island, the largest uninhabited island of Angola, is approximately antipodal to Johnston atoll, which is the third largest uninhabited island of the United States. Easter Island is antipodal to an area close to Desert National Park, from Jaisalmer, India. The only town on Easter Island, Hanga Roa, is antipodal to the village of Serawa northeast of Jaisalmer. Serawa is the only village in India to be antipodal to a human settlement. Its neighbouring villages Mokla and the northern part of Bhadasar also have antipodes on Easter Island. The small, rocky, uninhabited island of Isla Salas y Gomez, Sala y Gómez, east-northeast of Easter Island, is antipodal to an area in the city of Ajmer, India, just east of Ana Sagar Lake. All the rest of India has its antipodes in the sea. Kiritimati, the largest island of Kiribati and the largest coral atoll in the world, is antipodal to Salonga National Park, which is the largest national park of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the largest tropical rainforest reserve in Africa. Serra da Estrela Natural Park, the largest natural park of

, is antipodal to Kahurangi National Park, the second largest national park of

. South Georgia Island is antipodal to the northernmost part of Sakhalin Island. Lake Baikal is partially antipodal to the Straits of Magellan. The Russian Antarctic research base Bellingshausen Station is antipodal to a land location in

n Siberia. Rottnest Island, off the coast of Western Australia, is approximately antipodal to Bermuda. Cocos (Keeling) Islands, an Australian external territory in the Indian Ocean, is almost antipodal to Nicaragua's Corn Islands. Flores Island (Azores), Flores Island, the westernmost island of the Azores, is nearly antipodal to Flinders Island between Tasmania and the Australian mainland. Point Nemo, the point in the South Pacific Ocean most distant from any other land, is precisely opposite a desolate piece of desert in western Kazakhstan. By definition, the North Pole and the

are antipodes. Null Island, , at the intersection of the prime meridian and the equator, has its antipodes at , at the intersection of the antimeridian and the equator. This point lies northeast of Nikunau in the Gilbert Islands and southwest of Baker Island, a United States territory. As can be seen on the purple/blue map, the

is so large that it stretches halfway around the world; parts of the Pacific off the coast of Peru are antipodal to parts of the same ocean off the coast of Southeast Asia. For example, the island of Ko Chang—which is the second or third largest island in Thailand—is nearly antipodal to San Lorenzo Island, Peru, San Lorenzo Island, which is the largest island of Peru. The antipodes of the

, considered by early European explorers to be antipodal to the United Kingdom, are the town of Barfleur on France's Cotentin Peninsula. The remote Pacific atoll of Tematagi is antipodal to the Islamic holy city of Mecca, meaning the direction of Muslim prayer would vary widely from that of surrounding islands. Angkor Wat is roughly antipodal to Machu Picchu.

Countries

The following countries are opposite more than one other country. (Antarctica is considered separately from any territorial claims.) Countries matching up with just one other country are Morocco, Spain, Chad, Libya, Cameroon (with the Cook Islands of New Zealand); Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia (with French Polynesia); Senegal (Vanuatu); the UAE (Pitcairn); Ghana, Ivory Coast (Tuvalu); Burkina Faso (Rotuma in Fiji); Guinea (Solomon Islands); India (Easter Island); Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Thailand (all with Peru); Singapore (Ecuador); Brunei, Palau, Micronesia (all with Brazil); Venezuela and Suriname (Indonesia). Of these, the larger countries which are entirely antipodal to land are the Philippines, Malaysia, Taiwan, Fiji, Vanuatu, Brunei, and Samoa.

was as well prior to its expansion into the Atacama with the War of the Pacific. Antipodal Map of the United States Us antipodal map

Geological features antipodal to impact basins

In a number of cases on extraterrestrial bodies in the Solar System, unusual geologic features (e.g., jumbled terrain or unique volcanic constructs) are located antipodal to major impact basins. It has been hypothesized that this results from focusing of some of the seismic waves (p-waves and surface wave#Mechanical waves, surface waves) produced by an impact at its antipode. * Caloris Basin – "Weird Terrain" (Mercury (planet), Mercury) * Mare Orientale – Mare Marginis (The Moon) * Mare Imbrium – Mare Ingenii (The Moon) * Hellas Planitia – Alba Mons (Mars) * Isidis Planitia – Noctis Labyrinthus (Mars) * Kerwan (crater), Kerwan – Ahuna Mons (Ceres (dwarf planet), Ceres)

In popular culture

* In the William Shakespeare, Shakespeare comedy ''Much Ado About Nothing'', Benedick offers to travel from Messina to the Antipodes in an apparent attempt to avoid the company of Beatrice (Much Ado About Nothing), Beatrice. * On the TV show ''Angel (1999 TV series), Angel'', the Deeper Well is a hole that goes through the world, with its entrance in the Cotswolds in England and its antipode in New Zealand. * At the 2016 Summer Olympics closing ceremony#Warming up! Tokyo 2020, closing ceremonies of the Rio 2016 Olympics, antipodes were used as a tool to invite viewers to the 2020 Olympics, Tokyo 2020 Olympics, including an image of the video game character Mario using his pipes to travel between Tokyo and Rio, arriving at the closing ceremonies. * In the 2012 film ''Total Recall (2012 film), Total Recall'', a gravity train called "The Fall" goes through the center of the Earth to allow people to commute between Western Europe and Australia. * In 2006, Ze Frank challenged viewers of his daily webcast ''the show with zefrank'' to create an "Earth sandwich" by simultaneously placing two pieces of bread at antipodal points on the Earth's surface. The challenge was successfully completed by viewers in

and

. * The song “Ana Ng” by alternative rock band They Might Be Giants is about someone who believes that their soulmate lives antipodal to them. John Linnell, the singer and songwriter, has since joked that because the name Ng (name), Ng is Vietnamese and Peru is the antipode of Vietnam, “…the song, presumably, is about somebody in Peru, writing about somebody in Vietnam. But I didn’t know that when I wrote it.”

Notes

References

External links

Antipodes Map
Interactive map which draws an imaginary tunnel to the other side of the Earth.
findLatitudeAndLongitude
interactive tool to show antipodes
3D dual globe
schematic 3D representation of the earth and the anti-earth on the same place.

Tunnel to the Other Side of the Earth
Calculate the other side of the world

Antipodes
An online and photographic project which pairs webcam images from places on opposite sides of the globe.
Map Tunneller
Find out what part of the earth is directly below you using the interactive maps
Antipodal hotspots and bipolar catastrophes: Were oceanic large-body impacts the cause?

Antipode Finder
Tool to find the opposite side of the world by city or country.
Antipodes map
helps find the antipodes (the other side of the world) of any place on Earth.
Antipode Finder
Find the antipodal point of any location on the globe. {{Authority control Physical geography