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Fiji is an island country in Melanesia, in the South Pacific Ocean, about 2,000 km north of New Zealand. It is made up of more than 330 islands, about 110 of them lived on all year, plus hundreds of tiny islets. Most people live on the two big islands, Viti Levu and Vanua Levu, and about three quarters live on the coasts of Viti Levu, in and around Suva, Nadi and Lautoka. The islands are mountainous and volcanic in origin, with rainforest on the wetter eastern sides and sugarcane fields on the drier western sides.
People have lived here for about 3,000 years. The first settlers made Lapita pottery, and later waves of people from Melanesia and contact with Tonga and Samoa shaped Fijian culture. Chiefs and villages were, and still are, at the heart of indigenous Fijian life. Fiji became a British colony in 1874, and from 1879 the British brought tens of thousands of workers from India to the sugarcane fields. Fiji became independent on 10 October 1970, a date still celebrated as Fiji Day.
Today Fiji is a republic of about 900,000 people. A little over half are indigenous Fijians (iTaukei) and more than a third are Indo-Fijians, the descendants of the Indian workers, so churches, Hindu temples and mosques stand side by side and curry and roti are as Fijian as taro and coconut. Tourism, sugar, money sent home from abroad and bottled water are the pillars of the economy. Visitors come for coral reefs, white beaches and island resorts, and for the famous Fijian welcome.
Fiji's story runs from Lapita seafarers about 3,000 years ago, through powerful chiefdoms and the arrival of European traders and missionaries, to British rule from 1874 and the arrival of tens of thousands of workers from India. Fiji became independent in 1970. Since then it has lived through several coups, in 1987, 2000 and 2006, as well as new constitutions and elections, and it has also cheered two Olympic gold medals in rugby sevens.
By around 1000 BC, seafaring people of the Lapita culture, known for their stamped pottery, had settled in Fiji. People with Melanesian roots followed roughly a thousand years later, and Fiji also had close contact with Tonga and Samoa. Over the centuries Fijians built large sailing canoes called drua, fortified villages and a society led by chiefs.
The Dutch explorer Abel Tasman, searching for a great southern continent, sighted Vanua Levu and the islands north of Taveuni. He was the first known European to see Fiji.
The British navigator James Cook landed on one of the southern Lau islands in the east. Cook had heard of Fiji in Tonga, and the Tongan pronunciation of Viti, 'Fisi', gave the islands their English name.
After the mutiny on the Bounty, Captain William Bligh sailed in an open boat between Viti Levu and Vanua Levu on his long voyage to the Dutch East Indies. The strait he crossed is still called Bligh Water, and for a time Fiji was known as the Bligh Islands.
Seru Epenisa Cakobau, the powerful chief of the small island of Bau, had fought the missionaries and their allies. Under pressure from Tongan forces, foreign warships and his own rivals, he accepted Christianity in 1854. Methodist and later Catholic missions spread across the islands in the decades that followed.
Settlers and chiefs formed a government, and Cakobau was crowned King of Fiji at Levuka, the busy trading town on Ovalau. The kingdom struggled with debts, conflict over land and violent settlers, and lasted only three years.
On 10 October 1874 Cakobau, the Tongan chief Ma'afu and other senior chiefs signed the Deed of Cession at Levuka, handing Fiji to Great Britain. The Colony of Fiji lasted 96 years.
Cakobau and his sons caught measles on a visit to Sydney, and their ship was not quarantined on its return. In 1875 and 1876 the disease killed over 40,000 Fijians, about a third of the indigenous population.
On 14 May 1879 the ship Leonidas landed 463 workers from India. They came on five-year contracts to work in the sugarcane fields. They were the first of about 60,000 Indians who came before the scheme ended in 1916, and most chose to stay in Fiji when their contracts ended. Their descendants are the Indo-Fijians.
Levuka was squeezed between the sea and steep hills, with no room to grow. In 1877 the colony decided to move the capital to Suva on Viti Levu, and the administration completed the move in 1882.
The last ships carrying indentured workers from India arrived in 1916, and the system was wound up in the years that followed. By then about 60,000 people had made the journey, on 87 voyages.
The British flag was lowered in Suva at sunset on 9 October 1970, and Fiji became an independent country within the Commonwealth at midnight. 10 October is celebrated as Fiji Day.
In May 1987 the army overthrew a newly elected government that was mainly supported by Indo-Fijians, and a second coup followed in September. In October 1987 the military government declared Fiji a republic, ending the link with the British Crown. Many Indo-Fijians emigrated in the years that followed.
After a civilian coup in 2000, tensions between the army and the government grew again, and on 5 December 2006 the military took power. In April 2009 the Court of Appeal ruled the takeover illegal, the constitution was abrogated days later, and Fiji was suspended from the Commonwealth until 2014.
A new constitution was adopted in September 2013, and on 17 September 2014 Fiji held its first general election since the 2006 coup. International observers judged the vote credible.
At the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, Fiji's rugby sevens team beat Great Britain 43 to 7 in the final and won the country's first Olympic medal of any colour. The team won gold again at the Tokyo Games, held in 2021, and the victory was celebrated with a special 7 dollar banknote. At Paris 2024 they took silver.
Fijian food brings together the Pacific and India. In villages, a meal is built around a boiled root crop such as cassava or taro, with fish or meat, green leaves and plenty of coconut milk (lolo), and tea sweetened with cane sugar. Indo-Fijian families eat rice or roti with dhal and a meat or vegetable curry, followed by masala tea, and today these dishes are loved by everyone. Dinner is often the biggest meal. For weddings, church days and other big occasions there is the lovo, a feast cooked for hours in an earth oven. Chinese cooks added soy and oyster sauce, and the markets overflow with seafood, ferns, root crops and tropical fruit.
Fiji's best-known dish: pieces of fresh raw fish soaked in lime or lemon juice until they turn white, then mixed with coconut milk, diced tomato, onion and chilli. It is served cold, often in a coconut shell or a clam shell. Similar raw fish salads are made across Polynesia.
The citrus juice makes the fish firm and white, so it looks cooked, but it does not heat it. That is why very fresh fish matters.
A feast cooked in an earth oven. Stones are heated in a pit, then parcels of pork, chicken, fish and root crops wrapped in banana leaves are laid on top, covered with leaves, earth and sacks, and left to cook for several hours. Meat is often flavoured with soy sauce, garlic, chilli and ginger, and palusami (taro leaves filled with coconut cream) is a favourite lovo parcel.
A lovo takes many hands to prepare, which is part of why it belongs to weddings, church celebrations and family gatherings.
Fiji's national drink, made from the dried and powdered root of the kava plant, a relative of pepper. The powder is kneaded in water inside a cloth in a large wooden bowl called a tanoa, then served in half coconut shells. It looks muddy, tastes earthy and peppery, and makes the lips and tongue tingle and go numb for a few minutes. It is drunk at ceremonies and, more and more, simply with friends in the evening.
Kava roots are the classic gift, called sevusevu, that a guest presents when arriving in a Fijian village.
The starchy root of the taro plant, peeled and boiled or baked in the lovo, and served in chunks beside fish, meat and coconut dishes. It is the most important staple for special occasions. The young taro leaves, called rourou, are cooked in coconut milk as a green vegetable.
Fiji grows about 70 varieties of taro. Some turn pink or yellow when cooked, others stay white.
Cassava root, boiled in salted water until soft and eaten with stews and curries. It has taken the place of yams and is now the most widely grown and eaten staple in Fiji. Grated cassava is also sweetened and steamed in banana leaves to make desserts such as vakalolo.
The large round fruit of the breadfruit tree, which grows beside most village houses. When the fruit is in season it is boiled or roasted whole over a fire, and its soft, starchy flesh is eaten like bread or potato with fish and coconut dishes.
The unopened flower head of a close relative of sugarcane, sometimes called Fijian asparagus. It is sold in bundles at local markets in season and eaten raw or cooked as a vegetable. Some varieties grow wild along riverbanks.
Children love to gather and roast the red duruka that comes early in the season, before the white varieties ripen.
A thin, soft, round flatbread cooked on a hot iron plate, the everyday bread of Indo-Fijian homes. It is torn by hand and used to scoop up curry and dhal, and many Fijian families of every background eat roti and curry for breakfast or lunch.
A thin, golden soup of split peas or lentils, cooked with turmeric and finished with spices fried in hot oil or ghee. In Indo-Fijian homes it is served almost every day with rice, roti and a curry.
Curry came to Fiji with the Indian workers of the 1800s and is now eaten all over the islands, with chicken, goat, lamb, fish or vegetables. A typical home curry is cooked slowly with onion, garlic, ginger, curry powder and potatoes, and served with rice, roti, dhal and a spoon of chutney.
Black tea boiled with milk, sugar and spices such as cardamom, ginger and cloves. It is the main drink in many Indo-Fijian households, served morning and afternoon, often with a snack. Tea of every kind is a daily habit across Fiji.
Most Fijians live on Viti Levu. Suva, the capital, lies on the wet southeast coast, with Nausori just across the Rewa River. On the drier west coast are Nadi, the gateway for visitors, and Lautoka, the Sugar City, with Ba and Tavua further north and Rakiraki on the northern tip. Sigatoka sits on the sunny Coral Coast in the south. Across Bligh Water, Labasa and Savusavu are the main towns of Vanua Levu, and the old capital Levuka lies on the small island of Ovalau.
The capital, largest city and main port, on the southeast coast of Viti Levu. The city itself had about 94,000 people at the 2017 census, and about 270,000 lived in the wider area with Lami, Nasinu and Nausori, close to a third of all Fijians. It became the capital in 1882 and is a hub for the whole South Pacific, home to the main campus of the University of the South Pacific and the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat.
Fiji's second city, on the west coast of Viti Levu, with about 72,000 people at the 2017 census. It lies in the heart of the sugarcane country, has a large sugar mill and a busy port, and is known as the Sugar City.
A town of about 60,000 people on the west coast, home to Nadi International Airport, where most visitors arrive. Fiji's biggest cluster of hotels lies nearby on Denarau Island and along the coast, and boats leave from Port Denarau for the Mamanuca and Yasawa islands. Nadi has a large Indo-Fijian community.
A town of about 58,000 people on the Rewa River, 19 km from Suva, at one end of the growing Suva to Nausori corridor. A 425 m bridge over the Rewa, opened in 2006, links it to the capital, and the airport for Suva is nearby.
The largest town on Vanua Levu, built on a river delta in the northeast of the island. It grew up around sugarcane and a sugar mill, and it is heavily Indo-Fijian, with curry houses and sari shops downtown. Fijians call this part of the country the Friendly North.
A market town on the banks of the Ba River, 37 km from Lautoka, in sugarcane country. It is also the starting point for buses up into the Ba Highlands and the traditional village of Navala.
A town of about 18,000 people at the mouth of the Sigatoka River, 61 km from Nadi. It is the main centre of the Coral Coast, Fiji's strip of beach resorts along the south of Viti Levu.
A small port town of about 1,100 people on the east coast of the island of Ovalau. Founded by European traders around 1820, it was Fiji's first modern town and its capital until the move to Suva. The Fiji Times, still published today, was founded here in 1869.
A small town on a sheltered bay on the south coast of Vanua Levu, often called 'the hidden paradise of Fiji'. Yachts anchor in its harbour, and at low tide steam rises from hot springs all along the shore. Villagers have cooked taro and breadfruit in the hottest pools for centuries.
A small town on the north coast of Viti Levu, 91 km from Nadi and 9 km from the gold-mining settlement of Vatukoula. Roads lead from here into the highlands towards Mount Tomanivi, Fiji's highest peak.
The small town of Vaileka, usually called Rakiraki, on the northern tip of Viti Levu, about 130 km from Nadi International Airport along the King's Road. It is the main urban centre of Ra Province, although it has not been officially incorporated as a town.
Fiji's first colonial capital, a low line of wooden shopfronts, churches and houses set among coconut and mango trees along the beach. Look for the Sacred Heart Church, whose clock tower doubles as a lighthouse guiding ships through the reef, the Town Hall of 1898, and, at the southern end of town, Nasova, where the Deed of Cession was signed in 1874. It became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2013.
UNESCO World Heritage
A 650-hectare field of sand dunes, 20 to 60 m high, at the mouth of the Sigatoka River about 3 km west of the town. Walking trails cross the dunes to the sea. Archaeologists have found pottery more than 2,600 years old here, and one of the largest ancient burial sites in the Pacific.
An orchid garden of almost 20 hectares in Sabeto, at the foot of the hills about 10 minutes north of Nadi Airport. It was started in 1977 by the actor Raymond Burr, famous as television's Perry Mason, for his own collection of tropical orchids. Today it shows more than a thousand kinds of orchids along with native Fijian trees and flowers, a lily pond and a forest walk.
A brightly painted Hindu temple at the southern end of Nadi's main street, often described as the largest Hindu temple in the Southern Hemisphere. It is a place of worship and pilgrimage for Indo-Fijians and also welcomes visitors, who should dress modestly and remove their shoes.
The national museum, founded in 1904 and now set in Thurston Gardens, Suva's botanical gardens. It holds the world's most important collection of Fijian objects. The centrepiece is a 13 m double-hulled canoe, the Ratu Finau, and you can also see the rudder of HMS Bounty, war clubs, whale tooth ornaments and displays on the Indo-Fijian community.
A cool, green rainforest reserve in the hills just north of Suva, with walking trails, natural swimming pools under small waterfalls, and good birdwatching. It is part of the Queen's Commonwealth Canopy, a network of protected forests.
A village in the Ba Highlands with more than 200 bure, traditional houses with thatched roofs, all of a similar size. It is one of the few places in Fiji that is still completely traditional in its architecture. Buses run from Ba. Visitors pay a small fee to enter and take photographs, and should bring a sevusevu of kava for the chief.
The main Catholic church of Fiji, on Pratt Street in central Suva. It was built in 1902 of sandstone brought from quarries near Sydney, in a style inspired by the churches of Rome, and is decorated with stained glass, with a crypt below. It is the seat of the Archdiocese of Suva, created in 1966.
A group of about 20 small volcanic islands west of Nadi, with white beaches, clear water and coral reefs, and some of Fiji's best-known island resorts. About seven of them disappear under the sea at high tide. Boats leave several times a day from the marina at Port Denarau, and the pin marks Port Denarau, the harbour for the islands.
The 180th meridian runs across the island of Taveuni, but the International Date Line bends around Fiji so that the whole country shares one date and one time zone, with standard time 12 hours ahead of Greenwich. That makes Fiji one of the first countries to greet each new day.
Fijians call their islands Viti. The name Fiji comes from 'Fisi', the way their neighbours in Tonga said it, which James Cook heard and wrote down.
Fiji has more than 330 islands, but only about 110 of them are lived on all year.
Fiji's first Olympic medal of any colour was gold, won by the rugby sevens team in Rio de Janeiro in 2016. They won gold again at the Tokyo Games, and both victories appeared on special 7 dollar banknotes.
In February 2016 Cyclone Winston swept across Fiji. As of 2026 it is the most intense tropical cyclone on record in the Southern Hemisphere, and a wind gust of 306 km/h, a national record, was measured on the island of Vanua Balavu.
The sea between Viti Levu and Vanua Levu is called Bligh Water, after Captain William Bligh, who sailed through it in an open boat after the mutiny on the Bounty in 1789. The rudder of the Bounty is now in the Fiji Museum.
The Sawau people of Beqa island are famous firewalkers, able to walk across white-hot stones. Their tradition says an ancestor was given this power by a spirit god, in exchange for sparing the god's life.
A polished sperm whale tooth, the tabua, is one of the most precious gifts in Fijian ceremonies. In the past these teeth were used as a kind of currency.
Fiji became a republic in 1987, but Queen Elizabeth II stayed on its coins and banknotes until 2013. The new series shows Fiji's own plants and animals instead.
Many Fijian communities never eat shark, because sharks are linked to Dakuwaqa, the shark god of the sea. Killing or eating one is believed to bring misfortune on the village.
Levuka's Fiji Times, founded in 1869, is still published today, and Levuka Public School, opened in 1879, was the first public school in Fiji.
As of 2026, the American television show Survivor has filmed every season since 2016 in the Mamanuca Islands off Nadi.
Pronunciation is written the way it sounds; the capital letters show where the stress goes. Audio is coming soon.
If you visit a Fijian village, or are invited into a Fijian home, bring a bundle of dried kava roots as your sevusevu, the traditional gift. You can buy them at any town market. The village chief or head of the family will accept it in a short ceremony, and after that you are a welcome guest.
Swimwear belongs on the beach and at the resort. In towns and especially in villages and churches, cover your shoulders and knees, men and women alike. A sulu, a wrap-around cloth, is perfect, and villagers are often happy to lend one.
Fiji is warm all year, but tropical cyclones can strike from November to April. If you travel then, take out travel insurance, keep an eye on the weather forecast and follow local advice. The drier, slightly cooler months are roughly May to October.
Traffic in Fiji drives on the left. On the big islands, buses are cheap and frequent, run between all the towns, and in the countryside you can often simply wave one down as it approaches.
Fiji is a very religious country and many shops and businesses close on Sunday, when families go to church. Plan your shopping for Saturday, and if you are invited to a church service, go: the singing is unforgettable.
Tipping is not part of Fijian culture, and nobody will expect it in restaurants, taxis or hotels. At many resorts there is a staff 'Christmas box' where you can leave something to be shared among all the workers.
Tap water in the towns is treated and usually safe to drink. If you are unsure, for example in remote villages, boil or filter it. The tropical sun is strong: use sun cream and a hat, and cover up against mosquitoes at dawn and dusk.
