Overview
Solomon Islands, also known simply as the Solomons, is an archipelagic country in Melanesia, Oceania, located to the north-east of Australia. The country consists of six major islands and over 1,000 smaller islands, covering a total area of 28,896 square kilometres (11,157 square miles). According to official 2025 estimates, the population is 828,857. The capital and largest city, Honiara, is located on Guadalcanal, the largest island in the archipelago.
Solomon Islands is adjacent to Bougainville to the west, New Caledonia and Vanuatu to the south-east, Fiji, Tuvalu, and Wallis and Futuna to the east, and the Federated States of Micronesia and Nauru to the north. The country's name derives from the wider Solomon Islands archipelago, a collection of Melanesian islands that includes the Autonomous Region of Bougainville (part of Papua New Guinea), but excludes the Santa Cruz Islands.
Early Settlement and History
The Solomon Islands have been inhabited for tens of thousands of years. Archaeological evidence indicates that the islands were first settled between 30,000 and 28,000 BC by people from the Bismarck Islands and New Guinea. Later waves of migration, particularly the Lapita people who arrived around 1200–800 BC, mixed with the indigenous population and helped establish the modern Solomon Islander population. These Lapita peoples brought their characteristic ceramics and Austronesian languages, which became dominant across the islands.
Before European contact, Solomon Islands communities typically existed in small villages practising subsistence agriculture, though extensive inter-island trade networks existed. The people were known for headhunting and cannibalism before the arrival of Europeans, and numerous ancient burial sites and permanent settlements dating from AD 1000–1500 have been discovered throughout the islands.
European Discovery and Colonial Period
Spanish navigator Álvaro de Mendaña de Neira was the first European to visit the Solomon Islands in 1568, landing on Santa Isabel on 7 February. He explored several islands including Makira, Guadalcanal, and Malaita before returning to Peru in August 1568. Though Mendaña did not name the islands, they were subsequently referred to as the Solomon Islands by others, optimistically conflating reports of his voyage with stories of the wealthy biblical King Solomon and the Bible-mentioned city of Ophir.
Mendaña returned in 1595 with a larger crew to colonise the islands, landing in the Santa Cruz Islands and establishing a settlement at Gracioso Bay. This settlement failed due to poor relations with local peoples and disease, with Mendaña himself dying in October. Commander Pedro Fernandes de Queirós subsequently abandoned the settlement. Queirós returned to the region in 1606, though his voyage was primarily focused on Vanuatu in search of Terra Australis.
After these early Spanish expeditions, European contact remained sporadic until the late 18th century. British explorer Philip Carteret sailed through the islands in 1767, French explorers Louis Antoine de Bougainville and Jean-François de Surville visited in 1768–1769, and John Shortland sighted the Treasury and Shortland Islands in 1788. From the late 18th century onward, whaling vessels and traders from Britain, the United States, and Australia began visiting regularly, establishing trading relationships with islanders and introducing goods and diseases to the local population.
British Protectorate and Independence
In June 1893, Captain Herbert Gibson of HMS Curacoa declared the southern Solomon Islands a British protectorate. During World War II, the Solomon Islands campaign (1942–1945) saw intense fighting between the United States, British Imperial forces, and the Japanese Empire, including the famous Battle of Guadalcanal.
The British protectorate's official name was changed from the "British Solomon Islands Protectorate" to "The Solomon Islands" in 1975, followed by self-government in 1976. Full independence was achieved in 1978, when the country adopted the official name "Solomon Islands" (without the definite article) as defined in the Constitution. At independence, Solomon Islands became a constitutional monarchy. The King of Solomon Islands is Charles III, who is represented in the country by a governor-general appointed on the advice of the prime minister.