The 27 Sub-Regions of the World

The Country Similarity Index attempts to quantify how similar countries are to each other relative to other countries. The index is a statistically-based way to measure this. It weighs equally five major aspects of countries: their demographics, culture, politics, infrastructure, and geography. The methodology is exactly the same for each country.

The data from the Country Similarity Index was used to cluster countries into different regions. Some unique countries, like Bhutan, North Korea, and Israel, are very difficult to group with other countries. Therefore, it was necessary to make the largest regions still have a great deal of variation within them. This resulted in 9 distinct macro-regions:

1. The North & Australasia
2. Central & South America
3. Middle East & North Africa
4. Sub-Saharan Africa
5. Central Asia
6. South Asia
7. East Asia
8. Southeast Asia
9. South Pacific

However, these macro-regions still have very significant differences within them. Countries as different as Mongolia and Turkey are still grouped together. To account for this, the 9 macro-regions were further divided into 27 sub-regions. Some individual countries are their own “region” because they have many traits that make them especially unique.
Most countries neatly fit into one of these regions. However, there are a few countries that could be categorized into two different sub-regions. The countries that have characteristics of two different regions, like Zimbabwe, are shaded with the colors of both regions. The countries in each region and their individual pages are as follows:

The North & Australasia

The Anglo World (1-A)
United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, Ireland

The European Region (1-B)
Poland, Czechia, Hungary, Bulgaria, Serbia, Slovakia, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Slovenia, Montenegro, Germany, France, Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Cyprus, Iceland, Romania, Moldova, Albania

The North Eurasia Region (1-C)
Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia, Armenia

Central & South America

The Caribbean Region (2-A)
Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago, Bahamas, Guyana, Suriname, Belize 

The Latin American Region (2-B)
Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Venezuela, Guatemala, Ecuador, Dominican Rep., Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Panama, Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Bolivia, Paraguay, Cuba, Brazil

Cape Verde (2-C)
Mauritius (2-D)

Middle East & North Africa

The Arab World (3-A)
Saudi Arabia, U.A.E., Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Libya, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Lebanon, Yemen

Israel (3-B)

The Nastaliq Region (3-C)
Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan

Sub-Saharan Africa

The Sahel Region (4-A)
Niger, Mali, Chad, Somalia, Djibouti, Sudan, Mauritania

The Tropical Africa Region (4-B)
Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Senegal, Guinea, Benin, Togo, Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Burundi, D.R. Congo, Cameroon, Central African Rep., Rep. Congo, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Mozambique, Angola, Madagascar, South Sudan
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The Southern Africa Region (4-C)
South Africa, Lesotho, Namibia, Botswana, Eswatini 

The Ethiopic Africa Region (4-D)
Ethiopia, Eritrea

South Asia

The Hindu World (5-A)
India, Nepal

Bhutan (5-B)
Bangladesh (5-C)
Sri Lanka (5-D)

Central Asia

The Central Asian Region (6-A)
Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Turkey , Azerbaijan, Tajikistan

Mongolia (6-B)

East Asia

The Chinese Region (7-A)
China, Taiwan

The North Pacific Region (7-B)
Japan, South Korea

North Korea (7-C)

Southeast Asia

The Mainland Southeast Asia Region (8-A)
Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam

Singapore (8-B)

The Southeast Asia Island Region (8-C)
Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei, Philippines

South Pacific

The South Pacific Region (9-A)
Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Fiji, Samoa

East Timor (9-B)