The Most Mountainous Countries in the World, Counted Down From 10 to 1

Measured by mean elevation in the CIA World Factbook’s final 2026 edition, the most mountainous countries are Tajikistan (3,186 m above sea level on average), Kyrgyzstan (2,988 m) and Nepal (2,565 m), followed by Bhutan, Lesotho, Andorra, Afghanistan, Chile, China and Armenia. Mean elevation is the fairest single number for “most mountains”, because nobody agrees where one mountain ends and the next begins, while an average height rewards countries whose whole territory is high rather than those that merely own one famous summit.

That choice has consequences. Pakistan holds K2, the second-highest peak on Earth, yet averages only 900 m because the Indus plain is so low. India, with Kangchenjunga at 8,586 m, averages 160 m. The Factbook, which the CIA published from 1962 until it was discontinued on 4 February 2026, gives a mean elevation for almost every country, which makes it a consistent single source. Here is the top 10, counted down from tenth to first.

10 to 8: Armenia, China and Chile

10. Armenia, 1,792 m. Armenia sits on the Armenian Plateau, which geological upheaval pushed up about 25 million years ago. About half of its 29,743 km² lies at 2,000 m or more, and only 3 per cent is below 650 m; the lowest ground is in the Debed and Araks valleys, at roughly 400 m. The Lesser Caucasus runs through the north and east, Mount Aragats rises to 4,090 m, and even Lake Sevan, the country’s great lake, lies at about 1,900 m above sea level.

9. China, 1,840 m. China is the only giant in the top 10, and it earns its place through one feature: the Tibetan Plateau, the largest and highest plateau on Earth, covering about 2.5 million km² at an average height above 4,500 m. The plateau is ringed by the Himalayas, Kunlun and Qilian ranges and feeds the Yellow, Yangtze and Mekong rivers. The eastern lowlands, where most Chinese live, pull the national average down, and the Turpan Depression in Xinjiang drops to 154 m below sea level.

8. Chile, 1,871 m. Chile is a strip of land between the Andes and the Pacific, and about 80 per cent of its terrain is mountainous. The Andes in Chilean territory alone carry about 620 volcanoes, and the highest, Ojos del Salado at 6,893 m on the Argentine border, is the highest volcano in the world. A lower coastal range runs parallel to the Andes, with the Central Valley between them; the country’s lowest point is simply the Pacific shore.

7 and 6: Afghanistan’s Hindu Kush and Andorra’s Pyrenees

7. Afghanistan, 1,884 m. The Hindu Kush crosses Afghanistan from the northeast, where Noshaq reaches 7,492 m, and of the ranges that run southwest from it, the Koh-i-Baba reaches the greatest height, 5,142 m at Shah Foladi; the Safed Koh, meanwhile, dominates the border southeast of Kabul. The narrow Wakhan Corridor pushes east between the Hindu Kush and the Pamirs to the border with China. Afghanistan’s lower ground lies in the north along the Amu Darya, at 258 m, and in the southwestern deserts, which keeps the average below 2,000 m.

6. Andorra, 1,996 m. The smallest country in the top 10, at 468 km², Andorra lies wholly within the eastern Pyrenees between France and Spain. It is made of three narrow valleys in a Y shape that join as the Gran Valira river leaves for Spain at 840 m, the country’s lowest point. Sixty-five peaks stand inside its borders, led by Coma Pedrosa at about 2,940 m, and the Pic de Médécourbe marks the western tripoint with France and Spain.

5 and 4: Lesotho and Bhutan, two kingdoms without lowlands

5. Lesotho, 2,161 m. Lesotho is the only independent state that lies entirely above 1,000 m. Its lowest point, where the Makhaleng River meets the Orange (Senqu) at 1,400 m, is the highest low point of any country, and more than 80 per cent of the land sits above 1,800 m. The Drakensberg and Maloti ranges fill the east and centre, peaking at Thabana Ntlenyana (3,482 m). Lesotho is also one of only three countries enclaved within another, surrounded entirely by South Africa, and it sells its mountain water to its neighbour through the Lesotho Highlands Water Project. Our Lesotho country guide covers the kingdom in more depth.

4. Bhutan, 2,220 m. Bhutan climbs from the Duars plains on the Indian border, where the Drangeme Chhu leaves the country at 97 m, to the Himalayan crest on the border with Tibet, where peaks easily top 7,000 m. Its highest, Gangkhar Puensum (7,570 m), is the highest unclimbed mountain in the world. Most Bhutanese live in isolated highland valleys, including the one that holds the capital, Thimphu; only about 2 per cent of the land is arable, while forest covers about 70 per cent. Passes through the range were long the only routes in, which earned the kingdom the name “Mountain Fortress of the Gods”.

3: Nepal, from the Terai to Mount Everest

3. Nepal, 2,565 m. Nepal rises from Kanchan Kalan, 70 m above sea level in the Terai, to the summit of Everest at 8,849 m on the border with China, a climb of almost 8.8 km within a country of 147,516 km². Geographers divide it into three belts. The Terai lowland covers 17 per cent of the area; the Hilly region, mountains that rarely carry snow, covers 68 per cent; and the Himal, the snowy high Himalaya, the remaining 15 per cent. Some 90 of its peaks exceed 7,000 m and eight exceed 8,000 m, and the country spans eight climate zones from tropical to perpetual snow.

The Hilly region begins abruptly: a fault system called the Main Boundary Thrust throws up an escarpment 1,000 to 1,500 m high, behind which crests run at 1,500 to 2,700 m. Farther north the high Himalaya rise along the Main Central Thrust above a snow line at 5,000 to 5,500 m. Nepal ranks behind the two Central Asian republics mainly because of the low Terai, but its middle hills cover so much ground that it outranks Bhutan and every other Himalayan neighbour. For the range itself, from its geology to its highest peaks, see our guide to the Himalayas.

2 and 1: Kyrgyzstan’s Tian Shan and Tajikistan’s Pamirs

2. Kyrgyzstan, 2,988 m. The Tian Shan and Pamir systems occupy about 65 per cent of Kyrgyzstan, and almost 90 per cent of the country lies more than 1,500 m above sea level. Its highest point, Jengish Chokusu (7,439 m), sits in the Kakshaal Too on the Chinese border, and its lowest, on the Kara-Darya near the Fergana Valley, is 132 m. Kyrgyzstan is farther from the sea than any other country, and its rivers all drain into closed basins. About 6,500 glaciers cover some 8,048 km², or 4.2 per cent of the land, and Issyk-Kul in the northeast is the second-largest mountain lake in the world after Titicaca. It is also the only Central Asian state whose water resources are generated entirely within its own territory, which makes its mountains a water tower for the irrigated plains of Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan downstream.

1. Tajikistan, 3,186 m. Mountains cover 93 per cent of Tajikistan, and more than half of the country lies above 3,000 m. The Pamirs, known since the Victorian era as the “Roof of the World”, lie mostly in the eastern region of Gorno-Badakhshan; the Turkestan, Zeravshan and Hisor ranges, the westernmost extension of the Tian Shan system, cross the west, and the Hisor range rises just north of the capital, Dushanbe. Even the lowlands are high: the Fergana Valley bottoms out at about 320 m at Khujand on the Syr Darya. Ismoil Somoni Peak, at 7,495 m, was the highest mountain in the Soviet Union; it was first climbed on 3 September 1933, when it was called Stalin Peak. Tajikistan is the wettest of the Central Asian republics: the mountains receive up to 1,500 mm of precipitation a year, and as much as 223.6 cm of snow falls annually at the Fedchenko Glacier.

Pakistan, India and Switzerland: high summits, lower averages

The countries just outside the top 10 show what mean elevation rewards. Rwanda (1,598 m), Peru (1,555 m) and Mongolia (1,528 m) rank 11th to 13th. Rwanda has no lowland at all, since its lowest point, on the Rusizi River, is 950 m above sea level; Mongolia’s lowest, at Hoh Nuur, is 560 m, though its highest summit, Khuiten Peak, reaches only 4,374 m. Switzerland, the country most people picture when they think of mountains, averages 1,350 m, because the Swiss Plateau between the Alps and the Jura holds most of its towns and farmland at modest heights; its lowest point is Lake Maggiore at 195 m.

Pakistan and India are the most striking misses. Pakistan owns K2 (8,611 m) and much of the Karakoram, but the Indus plain and the Arabian Sea coast bring its mean to 900 m. India shares Kangchenjunga (8,586 m) with Nepal and holds long stretches of the Himalayas, yet the vast Indo-Gangetic plain and peninsular plateaus leave it at 160 m. If you want to rank countries by how tall their single highest summit is, the order changes completely; that list is set out in countries with the highest mountains.