Islam in Kiribati: history and Muslim population data

History of Islam in Kiribati

The Republic of Kiribati was conquered by the British in 1892 and gained its independence from the UK in 1979, when it changed its name from Gilbert Islands. It has a total area of 811 sq km and consists of 33 coral atolls covering over five million squared kilometers of the Central Pacific Ocean. By far the largest island is Kiritimati with area of 388 sq km, but only 6% of the population. Half of the population lives in Tarawa Atoll (31 sq km), where the capital Bairiki is located. There is 84 sq km of uninhabited islands.

Census is held here every five years, but Islam was added to the list of religions only in 2010. Accordingly, as shown in Table 6.3.3a, the Muslim population increased from 119 or 0.1% in 2010 to 139 or 0.1% in 2015, then decreased to 102 or 0.1% in 2020. As summarized in Table 6.3.3b, Muslims are found on ten atolls, but more than half lives on South Tarawa and fifth lives on Betio

Thus, assuming that the percentage of Muslims will remain constant; then the Muslim population is expected to be around 200 throughout the second half of this century.

Historical Muslim population dataset for Kiribati

The figures below are from the CoMPS historical dataset. Population values are expressed in thousands; 2100 is a modelled projection, not a present-day count.

For the full time series and visualisation, use the interactive map above.