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Geographical names index

The Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office's (FCDO) current list of approved British English-language names for countries and territories.

Updates to this page

From:
Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
Published:
8 March 2013
Last updated:
15 September 2026
Show all updates

  1. Update to UK Overseas Territory names list.

  2. Adding British Antarctic Territory to UK Overseas Territory names list.

  3. The UK Overseas Territory names attachment has been reviewed and updated: rows for 'Akrotiri’ and ‘Dhekelia’ have been replaced with a new single row: 'The UK Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia’.

  4. Adding Palestine to country names list.

  5. The official name for Libya changed to 'State of Libya'. The official name for Tunisia changed to 'Republic of Tunisia'.

  6. Updated Micronesia to Federated States of Micronesia.

  7. New link to Welsh language international place-names

  8. Country names data updated: the official name of 'Republic of Iceland' has been changed to 'Iceland'.

  9. Country names list updated: official name of Turkey changed to 'Republic of Türkiye'.

  10. Update to UK Overseas Territory names list.

  11. New list added: UK Crown Dependencies.

  12. Country names file amended: The Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal amended to Nepal

  13. Country names updated.

  14. New guidance added on the list of approved British English language names and descriptive terms for countries.

  15. Country names updated

  16. Updated country name Macedonia to North Macedonia

  17. Updated list of country names

  18. Country names list updated.

  19. Country names and Country and Territory names (HTML) files updated.

  20. Updated lists of countries and territories.

  21. FCO geographical names index - updated attachment.

  22. Updated with latest information.

  23. Updated with amended information.

  24. Update of both documents.

  25. First published.

  26. Updated Document.

Documents

Country names

CSV, 9.46 KB

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UK Crown Dependencies

CSV, 285 Bytes

View online

UK Overseas Territory names

CSV, 1.15 KB

View online

Notes on the FCDO list of approved British English-language names and descriptive terms for countries

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Details

These are the British English-language names and descriptive terms for sovereign countries, UK Crown Dependencies and UK Overseas Territories, as well as their citizens. ‘Sovereign’ means that they are independent states, recognised under international law.

The Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) approved these names. The FCDO leads on geographical names for the UK government, working closely with the Permanent Committee on Geographical Names.

In these lists:

  • ‘country’ is the 2-letter ISO 3166-1 code for the country
  • the ‘name’ is the FCDO-approved name for the country

All UK government departments and other public bodies must use the approved country and territory names in these datasets. Using these names ensures consistency and clarity across public and internal communications, guidance and services.

  • the full ‘official name’ is also provided for use when the formal version of a country’s name is needed

  • citizen names in the lists are not the legal names for the citizen, they do not relate to the citizen’s ethnicity

You can also view the Welsh language version of the geographical names index on GOV.WALES: international place-names.

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