Guinea-Bissau

Guinea-Bissau is a small country in West Africa.

The big Atlantic Ocean is on one side. The land is low and flat. The capital city is called Bissau.

Guinea-Bissau is a small country on the Atlantic coast of West Africa, between Senegal and Guinea. Almost all of it is low and flat. Every day the tide pushes seawater up its rivers, as far as 100 kilometers inland.

The country adds the name of its capital, Bissau, to tell itself apart from its neighbor Guinea. Off the coast lie many islands called the Bijagós. The 2026 census counted about 2.2 million people in Guinea-Bissau, and about half of them live in the countryside.

Guinea-Bissau lies on the Atlantic coast of western Africa, bounded by Senegal to the north and Guinea to the east and south, and includes the Bijagós (Bissagos) archipelago offshore. Britannica describes a country that is almost entirely low-lying and bathed daily by tidal waters reaching as far as 100 km inland; only in the southeast does the land climb toward the Fouta Djallon. The name Guinea is of debated origin, and the country adds the name of its capital, Bissau, to distinguish itself from Guinea.

Preliminary results of the 2026 national census (INE) counted 2,191,202 people on 36,125 km². The population is very young: about two-fifths are under 15. Roughly half live in rural villages. Since a military coup in November 2025, a transitional military government has run the country (Britannica, 2026).

Bissau is the biggest city.

A tall monument stands in a big square there. Old towns called Bolama and Cacheu are near the sea. Many islands lie out in the ocean.

Bissau, the capital, is the largest city and has the country's museum and national library. In a wide square in the city stands a tall monument to the heroes of independence.

Long ago, the small towns of Bolama and Cacheu were important ports. Out to sea, the Bijagós Islands are a World Heritage Site, added by UNESCO in 2025. Their beaches, mangroves and mudflats are home to sea turtles, water birds and hippos.

Bissau is the present capital and largest city; the Museum of Guinea-Bissau, the national library and the National Institute of Studies and Research are there. Britannica notes that Bolama and Cacheu were important towns during the slave trade and the colonial era; a long Anglo-Portuguese dispute over Bolama was settled in Portugal's favor in 1870, when U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant decided the case.

In 2025 UNESCO inscribed the Coastal and Marine Ecosystems of the Bijagós Archipelago – Omatí Minhô. Shaped by tides, sediment from the Geba and Corubal rivers, upwelling and converging longshore currents, its mangroves, mudflats and sandbanks support sea turtles, sharks, rays, manatees, dolphins and huge gatherings of water birds.

The sea comes far into the land.

It fills the rivers every day. Mangrove trees grow in the salty mud. There is a hot, rainy season and a hot, dry season.

The coast of Guinea-Bissau is a maze of flooded river valleys. The tide flows deep inland every day, and mangroves and mudflats line the water. Farmers use this tide water to flood big rice fields called bolanhas.

The weather is hot all year. The rainy season usually lasts from June to November, and April and May are the hottest months, with temperatures in the mid-30s °C. The coast gets a lot of rain, from 1,500 to 3,000 millimeters a year. Inland there is thick forest and then savanna, and forest covers about three-fifths of the country.

The coast is a dense network of drowned valleys (rias). Rivers such as the Cacheu, Geba and Corubal meander across a flat floodplain that floods easily in the rainy season. Britannica explains that the surge of brackish tidal water can irrigate the extensive drowned rice paddies called bolanhas. Soils suffered in the independence war: unused land eroded, and broken river dikes let salt spoil some fields.

The climate is tropical, driven by the intertropical convergence zone. The hot, rainy season usually runs from June to November; April and May are the hottest months, with temperatures in the mid-30s °C. The coast receives about 1,500–3,000 mm of rain a year. Britannica describes three ecological zones (tidal estuaries, a heavily forested interior plain and savanna), with forest on about three-fifths of the land. UNESCO calls the Bijagós the only active deltaic archipelago on Africa's Atlantic coast.

On the islands, hippos swim in the sea.

Big green sea turtles lay eggs on the beaches. Lots and lots of birds come to eat on the mud. Monkeys and leopards live in the forests.

The Bijagós Islands are one of the most important places in the world for nesting sea turtles. Five of the seven kinds of sea turtle visit them. On one small island, Poilão, green turtles dug more than 62,000 nests in 2020.

Hippos live there too, and they spend almost all their time in seawater, which UNESCO says they do nowhere else in the world. Huge flocks of water birds feed on the mudflats. On the mainland, flamingos and pelicans gather in the coastal swamps, and monkeys, chimpanzees, antelopes, hyenas and leopards live in the forests and savannas.

UNESCO considers the Bijagós probably the most important site in Africa for nesting sea turtles. Five of the seven species occur (green, olive ridley, hawksbill, leatherback and loggerhead), and the green turtle beaches of the islet of Poilão averaged 27,251 nests a year in 2013–2017, with more than 62,000 in 2020. Because the archipelago is a delta, freshwater species have adapted to rising marine influence: it is the only place on Earth where hippopotamuses live in seawater almost permanently.

The archipelago is the second most important African feeding area on the East Atlantic Flyway, with estimates of 200,000 to 850,000 birds and more than 283 bird species. On the mainland, Britannica describes flamingos and pelicans in coastal swamps and lizards, antelopes, monkeys, apes, hyenas and leopards in plains and forests. Elephants, once numerous, have been virtually eliminated, and many wild animals are hunted for meat and hides.

About 2.2 million people live in Guinea-Bissau.

People speak many languages. Many people speak a language called Crioulo. Rice is a very important food. Wrestling and football are favorite sports.

More than 20 different peoples live in Guinea-Bissau, among them the Balante, the Fulani, the Papel, the Malinke and the Bijagó, and about 20 African languages are spoken. To talk with each other, many people use Crioulo, a language that grew up here long ago. Portuguese is the official language.

Most families farm. They grow rice, vegetables, beans, cassava and peanuts, and they catch fish and shrimp. Cashew nuts are grown to sell abroad. Wrestling is one of the oldest and most popular sports, and a board game called ouri is played all over the country.

Britannica counts more than 20 African ethnic groups, including the Balante, the Fulani and their subgroups, the Diola, Nalu, Bijagó, Landuma, Papel (Pepel) and Malinke, plus a small Cape Verdean minority. About 20 languages and dialects of the Atlantic and Mande branches are spoken. Portuguese is official, but Crioulo, a creole that emerged during the slave trade, is the lingua franca. About two-fifths of people are Muslim, about one-fifth Christian (mostly Roman Catholic) and about one-sixth follow traditional beliefs; Christmas, Tabaski (Eid al-Adha) and Korité (Eid al-Fitr) are all observed.

Most work is farming for the family's own needs: rice, vegetables, beans, cassava, potatoes, palm oil and peanuts, with fish and shrimp for food and export. Cashews, palm products, timber and cotton have long been exported. Wrestling is among the oldest traditional sports, ouri is played everywhere, and the country's first Olympic athletes competed in wrestling at Atlanta in 1996.