Nauru Districts

Nauru is a single raised coral island in the central Pacific, about six kilometres long, with a ring road that goes all the way round it. It is the smallest republic in the world, and it is cut into 14 districts that meet like slices of a pie, from the coastal strip inland to the lagoon and the old phosphate plateau.

The quiz: Name to place, on the map
Grouped by: the south, the east and the north of the ring road
In the game: 14 districts

Start

What you are looking at

The districts of today, which have not changed, named as the country writes them. Almost all of them run from the shore to the middle of the island, so each is a wedge rather than a block. Yaren, the de facto capital, is the small one on the south coast, and the airport and the harbour sit in Yaren and Aiwo beside it. Buada is the odd one out, a green hollow around the Buada Lagoon in the south west with no stretch of its own to the sea.

The groups are not an official classification. Nauru also elects its parliament from eight constituencies, which merge some of the districts and do not tile the island evenly, so these are three stretches of the ring road instead, as a way to learn the map a piece at a time.

How to place one

Start with Yaren. It is the small district on the south coast, next to the airport runway, and every other name is easiest to find relative to it.
Go round the coast. Aiwo and Boe are the districts either side of it, and Meneng is the south east corner beyond them.
Follow the east coast up. Anibare, Ijuw, Anabar and Anetan come in order, with Anibare Bay in the first.
Finish at the north and the west. Ewa and Baiti are at the top, and Uaboe, Nibok and Denigomodu run down the west side towards Aiwo.

Every district, by group

South5 districts: Aiwo, Boe, Buada, Meneng, Yaren
East4 districts: Anabar, Anetan, Anibare, Ijuw
North5 districts: Baiti, Denigomodu, Ewa, Nibok, Uaboe

Worked examples

Yaren

The capital

Yaren is the smallest district and the one most people come to find: a patch of the south coast with the airport beside it, though the country has no official capital.

Buada

The inland one

Buada surrounds the island's only lagoon, in the south west, and is the one district that does not reach the sea.

Frequently asked questions

How many districts does Nauru have?

Fourteen, and together they cover the whole island, so the game has no territory outside them.

Is Yaren the capital?

Nauru has no capital in law. Yaren is where the parliament sits and is treated as one, and it is the district the game asks for most often by that name.

Why are the groups not the constituencies?

Parliament is elected from eight constituencies that merge several districts, so they would leave the game with groups of one and groups of three. The game groups the districts by where they sit on the ring road instead.