Bahrain Map

Bahrain is an archipelago in the Gulf of Salwa, between the Qatar peninsula and the Saudi coast. It has about 33 natural islands, plus a growing number of artificial ones. The official land area is about 787 square kilometers, and it is still growing through land reclamation. About 1.6 million people live there (UN World Population Prospects, 2025 estimate), which makes Bahrain one of the most densely populated countries in the world, at over 2,000 people per square kilometer. The 2020 census counted 1,501,635 residents, of whom 712,362 (47%) were Bahraini citizens.

The islands and causeways

Bahrain Island makes up most of the land. It is low and flat, rising in the centre to Jabal ad Dukhan, the "Mountain of Smoke", which at 134 meters is the country's highest point. Muharraq Island, with the international airport, lies to the north-east and is linked to Manama by causeways, as are Sitra and the reclaimed districts of Amwaj and Bahrain Bay. Far to the south-east, the Hawar Islands sit just off Qatar's west coast; they were awarded to Bahrain by the International Court of Justice in 2001. The 25 km King Fahd Causeway, opened in 1986, runs west to Al Khobar in Saudi Arabia and carries most of the country's road traffic with the mainland.

Freshwater springs, on land and bubbling up through the seabed, once supported date groves and gave the islands their name: al-bahrayn means "the two seas". Over-pumping has dried most of them, and drinking water now comes mainly from desalination. Summers are long, very hot and humid, peaking from June to September. November to March is the pleasant season for visiting.

Four governorates

Since 2014 Bahrain has had four governorates. In the 2020 census, the Capital Governorate had 548,345 residents, the Northern 379,637, the Southern 305,547 and Muharraq 268,106. The Southern Governorate is by far the largest in area, because it takes in the thinly populated south of the main island and the Hawar Islands.

• Manama: the capital, with Bab Al Bahrain and the old souq, the towers of the Bahrain Financial Harbour, and the Bahrain National Museum
• Muharraq: the former capital, where the Pearling Path links merchants' houses, oyster beds and a seashore fort (UNESCO, 2012)
• Riffa: a town in the centre of the main island, with royal palaces and the 19th-century Riffa Fort overlooking the Hunainiyah valley
• Isa Town and Hamad Town: planned towns built in the 1960s and 1980s to rehouse a growing population
• Sakhir: in the southern desert, home to the Bahrain International Circuit, which hosted the Middle East's first Formula One race in 2004
• Awali: a 1930s oil-company town near the first oil well at Jabal ad Dukhan

Dilmun, pearls and oil

In the Bronze Age, Bahrain was the centre of Dilmun, a trading civilisation that linked Mesopotamia with the Indus Valley. Its capital lies under Qal'at al-Bahrain, the Bahrain Fort site (UNESCO, 2005). Thousands of its burial mounds still dot the north-west of the main island, and they were inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 2019, Bahrain's third. For centuries pearling drove the economy, until Japanese cultured pearls and the Depression ruined the trade in the 1930s. In 1932 oil was struck at Jabal ad Dukhan, the first discovery on the Arab side of the Gulf. Bahrain's reserves are small, however, so it built a refinery at Sitra, an aluminium smelter (Alba), and a banking and services sector to make up the difference.

The Al Khalifa family has ruled since 1783. Bahrain was a British protected state from the 19th century until independence on 15 August 1971. A UN-backed consultation in 1970 found that Bahrainis wanted an independent state, and Iran dropped its old claim to the islands. Emir Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa proclaimed a kingdom in 2002. The ruling family is Sunni, while Shia Muslims are widely regarded as a majority of citizens; there are no official figures. Protests in 2011 were put down with the help of a GCC force led by Saudi Arabia. Bahrain hosts the headquarters of the US Navy's Fifth Fleet and normalised relations with Israel under the 2020 Abraham Accords.