which country will enter 2026 last

The last places on Earth to enter 2026 are the uninhabited US islands of Baker Island and Howland Island , followed (among inhabited places) by American Samoa and parts of Hawaii (especially Niʻihau and other far‑western areas).

Who enters 2026 last?

• The very last land areas to reach 00:00 on 1 January 2026 are Baker Island and Howland Island in the central Pacific, which lie on the world’s latest time zone (UTC−12) and are under United States jurisdiction.

• Among inhabited territories, American Samoa and nearby parts of the US, such as western Hawaii, are effectively the last communities to celebrate the New Year, coming roughly a full calendar day after places like Kiribati’s Line Islands.

Why these places are last

• Time zones are set by longitude, and the UTC−12 zone used for Baker and Howland Islands is the furthest “behind” Coordinated Universal Time, so midnight arrives there after all other zones have already crossed into 2026.

• Some nearby Pacific islands (like Samoa and Tokelau) chose in recent years to move to the other side of the International Date Line for economic ties, which is why they now celebrate among the first rather than the last, leaving the UTC−12 islands as the final ones.

Simple answer for the headline

• If the question is “which country will enter 2026 last,” the answer in everyday terms is the United States , via its remote territories of Baker Island and Howland Island, with American Samoa and far‑western Hawaii as the last inhabited areas to ring in the New Year.

Information gathered from public data and reporting on global New Year time- zone order.