Malawi(capital: Lilongwe)Capital: Lilongwe, the largest city. About 118,000 square kilometers. The UN files Malawi under Eastern Africa; wider lists of southern Africa include it.
Mozambique(capital: Maputo)Capital: Maputo. The Mozambique Channel separates it from Madagascar and the Comoros. The UN files it under Eastern Africa; wider lists of southern Africa include it.
Zambia(capital: Lusaka)Capital: Lusaka, in the south-central part of the country. Eight neighbors and no coast. The UN files Zambia under Eastern Africa; wider lists of southern Africa include it.
Zimbabwe(capital: Harare)Capital: Harare. Bulawayo is the second-largest city. It lies between the Zambezi and Limpopo rivers and has 16 official languages. The UN files it under Eastern Africa.
Other 14
Burundi(capital: Gitega)Capital: Gitega, the political capital. Bujumbura, the largest city, is the economic capital. Lake Tanganyika lies along the southwest side.
Comoros(capital: Moroni)Capital: Moroni. An archipelago of three islands, independent from France since 1975. The only member of the Arab League that lies entirely in the Southern Hemisphere.
Djibouti(capital: Djibouti)Capital: Djibouti, which shares its name with the country. About 23,200 square kilometers. Under France it was the colony of French Somaliland.
Eritrea(capital: Asmara)Capital: Asmara. About 117,600 square kilometers. The Dahlak Archipelago, off its long Red Sea coast, belongs to it.
Ethiopia(capital: Addis Ababa)Capital: Addis Ababa. The second most populous country in Africa. About 1.1 million square kilometers and no coast.
Kenya(capital: Nairobi)Capital: Nairobi. Mombasa is its second-largest and oldest city. It is a port on an island.
Madagascar(capital: Antananarivo)Capital: Antananarivo. The island is the fourth-largest in the world. The country is the second-largest island country.
Mauritius(capital: Port Louis)Capital: Port Louis. About 2,040 square kilometers. The main island and Rodrigues, with nearby Réunion, are part of the Mascarene Islands.
Rwanda(capital: Kigali)Capital: Kigali, at the center of the country. It is 1,567 meters above sea level. Mountains fill the west and savanna the southeast.
Seychelles(capital: Victoria)Capital: Victoria, about 1,500 kilometers east of mainland Africa. 115 islands, and the smallest country in Africa.
Somalia(capital: Mogadishu)Capital: Mogadishu. The easternmost country of mainland Africa. It has the longest coastline on the mainland.
South Sudan(capital: Juba)Capital: Juba. The Nile runs south to north through its middle. The river crosses a large swamp called the Sudd.
Tanzania(capital: Dodoma)Capital: Dodoma. Dar es Salaam is the largest city and main port. It is the former capital. The most populous African country that lies entirely south of the equator.
Uganda(capital: Kampala)Capital: Kampala. It has no sea coast. Its south takes in a large part of Lake Victoria, shared with Kenya and Tanzania.
How this list was compiled: The 54 countries are the African member states of the United Nations: https://www.un.org/en/about-us/member-states, checked 2026-09-19. The five regions and which country sits in which: United Nations Statistics Division, Standard country or area codes for statistical use (M49), https://unstats.un.org/unsd/methodology/m49/, checked 2026-09-19. Capitals: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_in_Africa, checked 2026-09-19; Ciudad de la Paz as the capital of Equatorial Guinea since January 2026: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equatorial_Guinea, checked 2026-09-19. The wider list of southern Africa: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Africa, checked 2026-09-19. Sudan filed under Northern Africa: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sub-Saharan_Africa, checked 2026-09-19. Two shapes of the drawing that the points file flags as disputed are not on this list and are never asked. Positions in the hints were read off the drawing; the two "largest shape" hints were checked against the areas of the drawn shapes. The former names of the capital of Equatorial Guinea that are accepted (Oyala, Djibloho, La Paz): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ciudad_de_la_Paz, checked 2026-09-19. The name Swaziland until April 2018: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eswatini, checked 2026-09-19. The three capitals of South Africa: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Africa, checked 2026-09-19. The second and later sentences of each detail line were read on 2026-09-19 in the lead of that country's article at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ followed by the country's name as the quiz labels it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_(country) and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_Ireland for those two); no detail line names a flagged shape or describes a border that is contested. Hints and detail lines written for this site. Licence: own work
The drawing: Drawn for this site from Natural Earth 5.1.2, ne_50m_admin_0_countries_lakes (scale 1:50,000,000), https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvkelso/natural-earth-vector/v5.1.2/geojson/ne_50m_admin_0_countries_lakes.geojson, downloaded 2026-09-19. Lambert azimuthal equal-area projection centred on 1°N 17°E. Outlines simplified; small islands are left out. One place is too small to draw at this scale and shown as a dot. Licence: public domain (Natural Earth terms of use: https://www.naturalearthdata.com/about/terms-of-use/)
How it works
This East Africa map quiz asks the 18 countries the United Nations files under Eastern Africa, on a map zoomed from the Red Sea to the Mozambique Channel. After each country it asks the capital.
Read the full guide
Why Zambia and Zimbabwe are on an East Africa quiz
The list is the UN one, and it is longer than most school lists, which stop at the Horn and the lakes. Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia and Zimbabwe are here because the UN files them under Eastern Africa. Sudan is not: the UN puts it in Northern Africa, and DR Congo in Middle Africa.
Rings and two capitals to watch
Burundi, Rwanda, Djibouti, Comoros, Mauritius and Seychelles are too small to tap, so each has a ring. The quiz wants Gitega for Burundi, not Bujumbura, and Dodoma for Tanzania, not Dar es Salaam.
The equator crosses three of the 18: Uganda, Kenya and Somalia.
Eight have no coast: Ethiopia, South Sudan, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Questions and answers
Which countries are in East Africa?
By the UN list, 18: Burundi, Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Rwanda, Seychelles, Somalia, South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The UN also files four territories there, such as Réunion; they are not asked.
What is the capital of Burundi?
Gitega, the political capital since 2019. Bujumbura, the largest city, held the title before that and is still the economic capital, so older atlases print it.
Is Tanzania's capital Dodoma or Dar es Salaam?
Dodoma is the capital. Dar es Salaam is the largest city and main port, and the capital before the government began moving to Dodoma, a plan announced in 1974.