Draw Papua New Guinea from Memory
Test your geography knowledge by drawing Papua New Guinea from memory on a blank canvas. Shape comparison scoring is coming soon — practice Papua New Guinea's outline in the meantime.
Related Countries in Oceania
Why Papua New Guinea Looks the Way It Does
More languages are spoken in Papua New Guinea than anywhere else on Earth — more than 800 of them, by the usual count, in a country of a few million people. The explanation is terrain. The central highlands run down the spine of the island in a maze of steep parallel valleys, fertile enough to farm densely and sharp enough to cut one community off from the next, and no indigenous state ever arose to impose a common tongue. So secluded were those valleys that the outside world did not know the highlands were inhabited at all until aerial surveys and gold prospectors flew over in the 1930s and found great populations living in country no European had charted.
The country occupies the eastern half of New Guinea, the second-largest island in the world after Greenland and one of the highest, and the land border with Indonesia is among the straightest lines in the Pacific: the 141st meridian east, fixed in the colonial negotiations between Britain and the Netherlands in the late nineteenth century. A small deviation near the south keeps the Fly River basin on the eastern side, one of the few places where geography got a vote.
Off the north coast a volcanic island arc runs parallel to the mainland — New Britain, New Ireland and beyond to Bougainville, which geologically belongs to the Solomons and voted overwhelmingly for independence in a 2019 referendum. The arc is live: Rabaul was buried under ash when the twin volcanoes framing its harbor blew in 1994, and the caldera that forms that harbor is the reason a town was ever built inside one.
Drawn from memory it works best as separate strokes — the bird-shaped mainland, the long tail, and the island wings arcing off to the north.
Quick Facts: Papua New Guinea
- Capital
- Port Moresby
- Continent
- Oceania
- Bordering countries
- 3 countries — Indonesia, Australia, Solomon Islands
- Area
- 462,840 km²
What is "Drawing Papua New Guinea from Memory"?
Drawing Papua New Guinea from memory means sketching Papua New Guinea's border on a blank canvas without looking at a map. Focus on the country's distinctive features and overall shape — that's what pushes your accuracy score up.
Papua New Guinea sits in Oceania and is rated ★★★★ out of 4 for drawing difficulty — one of the hardest borders on the site. It connects to 3 neighboring country pages on this site. Border comparison scoring for Papua New Guinea is coming soon — the shape tips below will get your mental map sharp before it lands.
Papua New Guinea fills the eastern half of the island of New Guinea, a large blocky landmass above the Gulf of Papua that tapers southeast into a long tail-like peninsula, with large islands arcing off its northern coast.
How to Draw Papua New Guinea from Memory
Step 01
Sketch the mainland first as a big, roughly blocky mass with the deep indentation of the Gulf of Papua cutting into its southern side. This is the eastern half of New Guinea, the world's second-largest island, so give it real size and weight before you add the trailing peninsula. The northern coast runs fairly straight, while the south is scalloped by the gulf.
Step 02
Add the most distinctive feature, the Papuan Peninsula: a long, tapering tail that stretches southeast from the mainland, like the tail of a bird in flight. The capital, Port Moresby, sits on the south coast where this tail begins, so angle the peninsula so that spot stays on the gulf side. Narrow the tail as it runs southeast to a pointed tip.
Step 03
Lock in the outline with the neighbors: Indonesia owns the western half of the island, sharing a straight border that runs roughly down the middle of New Guinea. Australia lies to the south across the Torres Strait, and the Solomon Islands sit to the east, so the tail should point toward them. Add New Britain and New Ireland as two arcs off the northeast coast.
Eastern half of a great bird: a broad body, a long tail stretching southeast, and island wings flaring off the north coast.
How Papua New Guinea Is Scored
When you hit Reveal & compare, your sketch is measured against Papua New Guinea's real border, point by point, in the same canvas space. Three numbers come back:
Matched — the share of the real border your drawing covered. 100% means you traced every part of the outline.
Extra — how much of your drawing fell outside the true border. This catches sketches that are too big, mispositioned, or drifting off.
Missed — the border you didn't reach, the flip side of Matched.
The three combine into a single 0–100 accuracy score. The rating names give you a target: 80+ is Cartographer, 60+ is Border patrol, 40+ is Getting there, and below 40 is Try again.
Automated scoring for Papua New Guinea is coming soon. When it ships, drawing large and centered will be the fastest way to raise your score, because a small sketch overlaps less of the true border.
FAQ
- Which countries are Papua New Guinea's neighbors?
- Papua New Guinea connects to 3 neighboring country pages on this site: Indonesia, Australia, and Solomon Islands. Once you've drawn Papua New Guinea, try a neighbor next — drawing two shapes side by side locks both into your mental map.
- How hard is it to draw Papua New Guinea from memory?
- Papua New Guinea is rated ★★★★ out of 4 for drawing difficulty — one of the hardest borders on the site. Automated scoring is coming soon, so use the shape tips below to practice in the meantime.
- How is my Papua New Guinea drawing scored?
- Once Papua New Guinea's border data goes live, your sketch will be compared with the real border point by point. You'll get a 0–100 score built from Matched, Missed, and Extra, plus a clear overlay showing where you nailed it and where you drifted.
- Can I draw Papua New Guinea on mobile?
- Yes — Papua New Guinea works on desktop, tablet, and mobile. Draw with your finger on touchscreens; no app download is required and it runs directly in your browser.