Latvia 🇱🇻
Latvia is a country in Europe with a population of 1,850,651. Its capital is Riga. The official currency is EUR, and the main languages are Latvian.
Quick facts
- Capital: Riga
- Continent: Europe
- Population: 1,850,651 (The figure of 1,850,651 is an earlier estimate. The World Bank puts Latvia's population at 1,866,124 for 2024.)
- Area: 64,589 km²
- Density: 28.7 people per km²
- Currency: EUR
- Languages: Latvian
- ISO code: LV
Where Latvia sits
Latvia 🇱🇻 is one of 46 countries in Europe, with its capital at Riga. It covers 64,589 square kilometres — 122nd in the world — and is home to about 1,850,651 people, 149th globally.
The countries it shares a continent with include Russia, Germany, United Kingdom, France and Italy. If you are learning geography region by region — which works far better than alphabetically, because memory for places is spatial — those are the ones to learn alongside it.
How Latvia compares
Raw figures are hard to hold on their own, so it helps to anchor them. In population, Latvia sits closest to Kosovo and Equatorial Guinea. In land area, its nearest counterparts are Lithuania and Sri Lanka.
At 28.7 people per square kilometre it is about 2.1 times below the world average of 59.4. It ranks higher by area than by population, so it is more spacious than its population alone suggests.
Latvian is listed as official in Latvia alone. The EUR is shared with 25 other countries, including Andorra, Austria and Belgium, and 22 others.
To see Latvia next to every other country, sort the country rankings by population, area or density; its currency and languages are listed alongside every other country's in world currencies and world languages.
How to remember Latvia
Read the Baltic states from north to south as E-L-L: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. Latvia is the middle one, and Riga sits in the middle of the curve of the Gulf of Riga, the bay that shares its name. For the flag, picture a red sandwich with one thin slice of white in the middle.
The flag of Latvia: carmine (dark) red and white
🇱🇻 The flag is a dark carmine-red flag with a thin white horizontal stripe across the middle. The red is often said to stand for the Latvians' readiness to defend their freedom. The design is one of the oldest in the world: a medieval chronicle describes a red flag with a white stripe being used around 1280.
Region and neighbours
Latvia is the middle of the three Baltic states in Northern Europe, on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea and wrapped around the Gulf of Riga. It shares land borders with 4 countries: Estonia, Lithuania, Belarus and Russia.
- Estonia 🇪🇪 — capital Tallinn
- Lithuania 🇱🇹 — capital Vilnius
- Belarus 🇧🇾 — capital Minsk
- Russia 🇷🇺 — capital Moscow
Three facts about Latvia
- Riga is the largest city in Latvia, and about a third of all Latvians live there.
- More than half of Latvia is covered by forest.
- Latvia joined the European Union and NATO in 2004 and adopted the euro in 2014.
Sources: Wikipedia: Latvia, Wikipedia: Flag of Latvia, Wikipedia: Riga, CIA World Factbook.
Quiz yourself on Latvia
- European capitals quiz — match Latvia to Riga
- European flags quiz — spot the Latvia flag among its neighbours
Quizzes that include Latvia
Three angles are worth covering for any country — where it is, what its flag looks like, and what its capital is. For Latvia those are:
- Europe map quiz — place it on a blank map
- Europe flags quiz — identify its flag among its neighbours
- Europe capitals quiz — match it to Riga
- Latvia capital quiz — five quick questions starting with Latvia
- Daily Map Challenge — five countries to find on a blank world map, the same five for everyone each day
Doing all three for one continent before moving on is far more efficient than learning flags globally, then capitals globally, then the map.
Read more about Latvia
- Capital of Latvia: Riga — the capital in detail, with size and density rankings
- All 46 countries of Europe
Nearby countries
- Albania 🇦🇱 — capital Tirana
- Andorra 🇦🇩 — capital Andorra la Vella
- Austria 🇦🇹 — capital Vienna
- Belarus 🇧🇾 — capital Minsk
- Belgium 🇧🇪 — capital Brussels
- Bosnia and Herzegovina 🇧🇦 — capital Sarajevo
- Bulgaria 🇧🇬 — capital Sofia
- Croatia ðŸ‡ðŸ‡· — capital Zagreb
- Cyprus 🇨🇾 — capital Nicosia
- Czechia 🇨🇿 — capital Prague
- Denmark 🇩🇰 — capital Copenhagen
- Estonia 🇪🇪 — capital Tallinn
Frequently asked questions
What are the colours of the Latvia flag?
The flag of Latvia is a dark carmine-red flag with a thin white horizontal stripe across the middle. The red is often said to stand for the Latvians' readiness to defend their freedom. The design is one of the oldest in the world: a medieval chronicle describes a red flag with a white stripe being used around 1280.
Which countries border Latvia?
Latvia shares land borders with Estonia, Lithuania, Belarus and Russia.
How can I remember the capital of Latvia?
Read the Baltic states from north to south as E-L-L: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. Latvia is the middle one, and Riga sits in the middle of the curve of the Gulf of Riga, the bay that shares its name. For the flag, picture a red sandwich with one thin slice of white in the middle.