All 11 countries that start with T
This list counts the 195 states the United Nations recognizes as members or observers, the same 195 the Geography app and its country quiz use, so the total here will never drift from the total anywhere else on this site. Territories, disputed states, and former names are not counted separately, and the count is generated directly from that dataset rather than typed by hand.
| Country | Capital | Continent | Context |
|---|---|---|---|
 Tajikistan | Dushanbe | Asia | A mountainous Central Asian country, over ninety percent of its territory covered by mountains. |
 Tanzania | Dodoma | Africa | An East African country home to Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa's tallest peak, and the Serengeti. |
 Thailand | Bangkok | Asia | The only Southeast Asian country never colonized by a European power. |
 Timor-Leste | Dili | Asia | A young Southeast Asian nation, formerly East Timor, independent from Indonesia since 2002. |
 Togo | Lome | Africa | A narrow West African country on the Gulf of Guinea, one of the smallest by area on the continent. |
 Tonga | Nuku'alofa | Oceania | A Polynesian kingdom of over 170 islands, one of the few Pacific nations never formally colonized. |
 Trinidad and Tobago | Port of Spain | North America | A twin island Caribbean nation just off the coast of Venezuela, the birthplace of steelpan music. |
 Tunisia | Tunis | Africa | A North African country whose 2011 uprising is widely credited with starting the Arab Spring. |
 Turkmenistan | Ashgabat | Asia | A largely desert Central Asian country holding some of the world's largest natural gas reserves. |
 Tuvalu | Funafuti | Oceania | One of the smallest and lowest lying countries in the world, at high risk from rising seas. |
 Türkiye | Ankara | Asia | A transcontinental country spanning Europe and Asia, whose government asked the world to use Türkiye instead of Turkey from 2022. |
Where these eleven sit on the map
Asia holds the largest share, with five: Tajikistan, Thailand, Timor-Leste, Turkmenistan, and Türkiye, spread from Central Asia to Southeast Asia to the edge of Europe. Africa contributes three, Tanzania, Togo, and Tunisia, and Oceania two, Tonga and Tuvalu, both Polynesian island nations. Trinidad and Tobago is the letter's only entry from the Americas, a twin island state just off the coast of Venezuela.
Tanzania stands out geographically, home to Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa's tallest peak, and to the Serengeti, one of the continent's best known wildlife regions. Thailand and Tonga share an unusual distinction: both avoided formal colonization by a European power, Thailand through a mix of diplomacy and geography between British and French spheres of influence in Southeast Asia, and Tonga by remaining a self governing kingdom throughout the Pacific's colonial era. Turkmenistan, largely desert, holds some of the largest proven natural gas reserves in the world, a resource base that shapes its economy far more than its small population would suggest.
Naming edge cases worth knowing
Timor-Leste is the country's official name, and East Timor remains common in everyday English; both resolve to the same entry here, filed under T rather than E. Türkiye is the spelling the Turkish government asked the United Nations and the wider world to adopt in place of Turkey starting in 2022, intended to better match the country's own pronunciation of its name and to distance it from the unrelated English word for the bird; this dataset uses Türkiye as the primary name with Turkey kept as an alias. Trinidad and Tobago, like Bosnia and Herzegovina and Antigua and Barbuda, is one country with two island names joined by and, and it files as a single entry under T.
Quick facts
- Eleven countries start with T, out of the 195 UN member and observer states.
- Five of the eleven, nearly half, are in Asia.
- Timor-Leste is the official name for the country commonly called East Timor.
- Türkiye is the spelling its government requested in place of Turkey from 2022 onward.