Southern Asia · AsiaPakistan
Discover Pakistan - home to K2 and ancient Indus civilizations, where the world's highest highways wind through spectacular mountains and vibrant bazaars pulse with life.
Where Is Pakistan?
Pakistan is a country in Southern Asia. Its capital is Islamabad.
- Capital Islamabad
- Population 255M
- Area 796,095 km²
Pakistan is a country of staggering extremes. In the north, the Karakoram Highway - the highest paved road on Earth - threads through mountains so massive they make the Alps look like foothills. K2, the world's second highest peak at 8,611 meters, rises here, along with over 100 other summits above 7,000 meters. The Karakoram, Himalaya, and Hindu Kush ranges converge in northern Pakistan in a knot of rock and ice found nowhere else on the planet. This is the most vertically dramatic landscape on Earth.
Then there is the other Pakistan - 230 million people making it the world's fifth most populous country, with a history stretching back to the Indus Valley Civilization, one of the oldest in human history. Mohenjo-daro, built around 2500 BCE, had running water and a sewage system thousands of years before most of Europe. Lahore's Mughal architecture rivals anything in India. Karachi is a megacity of 15 million that never sleeps. The food alone is worth the journey - from Lahore's legendary food street to the spice-heavy cuisine of Peshawar. Pakistan is complicated, contradictory, and overwhelming, but for those who visit, it is unforgettable.
The country's cultural fabric is woven from Punjabi, Sindhi, Pashtun, Baloch, and many other ethnic threads. Sufi shrines draw millions of devotees who dance and sing in spiritual ecstasy. Truck art - the wildly colorful decoration of commercial vehicles - is a folk art tradition unlike anything else on Earth. Cricket is not just a sport but a national religion, and when Pakistan wins, 230 million people celebrate as one.
At a glance
Largest cities in Pakistan
Karachi
Lahore
Islamabad
Peshawar
Quetta
Famous people from Pakistan
Muhammad Ali Jinnah
PoliticsFounder of Pakistan who led the movement for a separate Muslim state and became the country's first Governor-General in 1947
Malala Yousafzai
ActivismYoungest-ever Nobel Peace Prize laureate who survived a Taliban assassination attempt and became a global symbol of girls' education
Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan
MusicGreatest qawwali singer in history who brought Sufi devotional music to global audiences and influenced artists from Peter Gabriel to Eddie Vedder
Abdus Salam
ScienceFirst Pakistani and first Muslim Nobel laureate in science, who won the Physics prize in 1979 for unifying electromagnetic and weak nuclear forces
Imran Khan
SportLed Pakistan to its only Cricket World Cup victory in 1992 as captain, one of the greatest all-rounders in cricket history
Traditional cuisine of Pakistan
- Biryani
- Fragrant layered rice dish with spiced meat, saffron, and caramelized onions - Karachi's version is a fiercely debated point of pride
- Nihari
- Slow-cooked beef stew simmered overnight with bone marrow and spices, eaten for breakfast in Lahore with fresh naan
- Chapli Kebab
- Peshawar's signature flat meat patties made with minced beef, tomatoes, and pomegranate seeds, grilled to crispy perfection
- Haleem
- Thick stew of wheat, lentils, and slow-cooked meat, a comfort food staple especially popular during Ramadan
- Seekh Kebab
- Spiced minced meat molded around skewers and grilled over charcoal, a street food staple found across the country
Nature and landmarks in Pakistan
- K2Mountain
- World's second highest peak at 8,611 meters and the most dangerous of the 8,000-meter mountains, with a summit death rate far exceeding Everest
- Hunza ValleyMountain
- Spectacular valley in Gilgit-Baltistan surrounded by 7,000-meter peaks, with terraced farms, ancient forts, and cherry blossom springs
- Deosai National ParkNational Park
- One of the highest plateaus in the world at 4,000 meters, home to Himalayan brown bears and carpeted in wildflowers each summer
- Mohenjo-daroLandmark
- UNESCO-listed ruins of a 4,500-year-old Indus Valley city in Sindh, one of the world's earliest and most sophisticated urban settlements
- Fairy MeadowsMountain
- Alpine grassland at the base of Nanga Parbat's massive north face, offering one of the most dramatic mountain views on Earth
Sports in Pakistan
- Cricket
- Won the Cricket World Cup in 1992 and the T20 World Cup in 2009, producing legends like Imran Khan, Wasim Akram, and Babar Azam
- Hockey
- Won four Olympic gold medals and four World Cups in field hockey, once the undisputed dominant force in the sport
- Squash
- Pakistan dominated world squash for decades through Jahangir Khan and Jansher Khan, who held the world number one ranking for a combined 20 years
Did you know?
Pakistan has more glaciers than anywhere outside the polar regions - over 7,000 in the Karakoram and Himalaya ranges
The Karakoram Highway, connecting Pakistan to China, is the highest paved international road in the world at 4,693 meters
Mohenjo-daro had a sophisticated sewage and drainage system around 2500 BCE, millennia before most European cities
Pakistani truck art is a folk art tradition where commercial trucks are decorated with elaborate paintings, poetry, and metalwork
Pakistan's national sport is field hockey, not cricket, despite cricket being far more popular among the population
The Khewra Salt Mine in Punjab is the world's second largest salt mine, with tunnels carved into pink salt that glow when illuminated
Jahangir Khan won 555 consecutive squash matches over five years, the longest winning streak in professional sports history
Can you find Pakistan on a map?
Drop a pin where you think it is and see how close you got. A few rounds and you will place Pakistan and its neighbours without a second thought.
