Estonian World and its co-authors unveil 100 captivating insights that blend time-honored traditions with unexpected surprises, offering a fresh lens on the nation’s unique legacy.
1. Estonia has one of the lowest population densities in the world (28 per sq km; 72.5 per sq mi), ranking 188th globally.
2. Estonia is slightly larger than Denmark and has a fragmented coastline dotted with 1,521 islands.
3. Estonia has the European Union’s fourth-smallest population and eighth-smallest land area.
4. The country is as flat as a pancake – its highest peak rises to just 318 metres (1,043 ft) above sea level – yet it’s still the highest point in the Baltic states.
5. According to the largest-ever global study of human height, Estonian men and women are the third-tallest people on Earth.
6. One of the largest meteorites to strike Earth in recent history landed on the island of Saaremaa, in what is now the village of Kaali.
7. Saaremaa is also where, by one measure, the centre of Europe is located.
8. Oleviste (St Olaf’s) Church in Tallinn was the tallest building in the world from 1549 to 1625.
9. As of 2018, Estonia has the highest number of supermodels per capita.
10. In modern Estonia, it’s possible to do practically anything online – pay for parking, run a business, file your taxes, vote, and much else besides.
11. Estonian women had the right to vote as early as 1917.
12. Sauna culture is thought to date back some 4,000 years, but Tallinn’s oldest public sauna opened in 1310 on Nunne Street and later became known as Stockeri saun. The words still used in Estonian today – saun and wicht (now viht) – were first recorded in the 13th century.
13. In traditional Estonian society, the sauna was a miniature centre of health and hygiene, where people marked the beginning, middle and end of their lives. Today, the Estonian town of Otepää hosts Europe’s largest sauna marathon.
14. The world’s most performed living composer, Arvo Pärt, is Estonian.
15. Estonians are world champions in wife-carrying, an international sport recognised with a category in the Guinness Book of Records.
16. Estonia offers one of the world’s best environments for building digital trust.
17. As of 2018, Estonia ranks third in Europe for startups per capita.
18. Finnish television served as a window on the free world during the Soviet occupation, and practically every Estonian has been to Finland.
19. Graham Greene’s Our Man in Havana could easily have been titled Our Man in Tallinn, as the action in one of the book’s earliest versions was set in the pre-war capital of a Baltic state, strikingly similar to Tallinn.
20. In To Have and Have Not, Ernest Hemingway casually remarked that “No well-run yacht basin in Southern waters is complete without at least two sunburned, salt bleached-headed Esthonians”. It has become one of the most frequently misquoted lines in Estonia, usually paraphrased as: “In every port in the world, at least two Estonians can be found”. There is, however, a significant difference between yacht basins in southern waters (in the novel, the waters between Florida and Cuba) and every port in the world.
21. Many famous people have visited Estonia at one time or another. Perhaps the most intriguing are John F. Kennedy, who visited in 1939, long before he became President; Neil Armstrong, the first man on the Moon, who paid a brief visit in the late 1970s; and Billy Graham, one of the world’s best-known Christian evangelists, who in 1984 delivered a sermon at Tallinn’s St Olaf’s Church.
22. Estonia’s capital, Tallinn, was home to the first publicly displayed Christmas tree in 1441 – though Latvians dispute this claim.
23. Out of nearly 200 countries worldwide, Estonia ranks second for adult literacy (after Latvia), with a rate of 99.8 per cent. (North Korea claims 100 per cent, though such figures are widely treated with caution.)
24. Estonia has considerably more women than men – for every 100 women, there are 84 men. Only the Northern Mariana Islands has a lower proportion of men.
25. Estonia is one of the least religious countries in the world, with only 16% of the population saying religion has any importance in their lives. At the same time, 69% believe that trees have a soul.
26. Although Estonia is considered one of the Baltic states, it has no close cultural or linguistic ties to Latvia and Lithuania – instead, its language and many aspects of its culture are closely related to Finland’s.
27. Estonian is considered one of the most challenging languages for native English speakers to learn.
28. Estonia is one of Europe’s greenest countries – around 50 per cent of its land area is covered by forest.
29. Skype’s software was created by four Estonian programmers, even though the company was founded by a Dane and a Swede.
30. From the 13th century onwards, the country was repeatedly invaded from abroad, and for most of its history Estonians lived under foreign rule – Danish, German, Polish, Swedish, Russian and Soviet.
31. Tallinn is one of the best-preserved medieval cities in Europe.
32. Although most Estonians (or at least those who are religious) are Lutheran Protestants, Estonia’s first president, Konstantin Päts, was an Orthodox Christian.
33. Estonia’s history might have taken a very different turn had the Vaps Movement (the organisation of veterans of the Estonian War of Independence, with nationalist leanings akin to Italian Fascism and German Nazism) succeeded in taking power in 1934. Their rise was, however, thwarted by Konstantin Päts – then the State Elder (the title of the head of state at the time) – who imposed an authoritarian regime that lasted until 1940, when the Soviet Union occupied Estonia for the first time. The period from 1934 to 1940 is known as the Era of Silence, and it remains one of the few blemishes on the history of the Republic of Estonia.
34. Estonia celebrated its centenary in 2018 despite decades of occupation by both the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany, because under international law those occupations were illegal. Legally, the Republic of Estonia has existed continuously since 24 February 1918, and during the years of occupation the state’s continuity was maintained through a government-in-exile. When Estonia restored its independence in 1991, the government-in-exile formally transferred its authority to the duly elected government, which resumed the republic proclaimed in 1918.
35. Estonia’s second president, Lennart Meri, was best known as an author and filmmaker before entering politics. He only stepped into public office in 1990, at the age of 61, when he became foreign minister in the transitional government. Elected president in 1992, he served two terms, until 2001.
36. One of the most significant statesmen Estonia has produced is Mart Laar, who in 1992, at the age of 32, became the first prime minister of post-occupation Estonia. Under his leadership, Estonia was the first in Europe to introduce a flat tax; it privatised much of state industry through transparent public tenders; abolished tariffs and subsidies; stabilised the economy; and balanced the budget. Perhaps most crucially, it restored the pre-occupation currency, the kroon, and pegged it to the stable Deutsche Mark. He served a second term as prime minister from 1999 to 2002.
37. The Estonian national flag – the blue, black and white tricolour – represents the sky, the soil, and the Estonians’ pursuit of light and happiness. In 1884, the Estonian Students’ Society adopted the flag as its own; after Estonia declared independence in 1918, it became the national flag.
38. On 23 August 1989, Estonians took part in the Baltic Way together with Latvians and Lithuanians, forming a human chain across the three countries. Around two million people joined to mark the tragedy set in motion by the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, signed 50 years earlier on the same date. The protest was designed to draw global attention by demonstrating a popular desire for independence in all three states.
39. Estonians, like Mexicans, put sour cream (a leaner cousin of crème fraîche) on almost everything. And anyone who’s had Mexican food knows it’s not as alarming as it sounds – it’s actually rather delicious.
40. At Christmas, Estonians eat something called blood sausage – a mixture of pork, barley, animal blood and spices. This, again, is not as unappetising as it sounds: it’s quite similar to English black pudding, albeit with a distinctively Estonian touch.
41. Estonian cuisine is a blend of German, Russian and Scandinavian influences. Yet, despite that – or perhaps because of it – it doesn’t quite resemble any of them.
42. As a largely non-religious nation, Estonia sees around half of marriages end in divorce. By the divorce-to-marriage ratio, the country ranks 12th in the world. And that isn’t necessarily a bad thing: it can be healthy for people to change their minds – and to do so when it’s right for them, without having to face society’s scrutiny.
43. Tallinn can be considered an Olympic city – in 1980, when the Summer Olympics were held in Moscow, the Olympic sailing regatta took place in Tallinn.
44. Estonians were among the last pagans in Europe, before Christianity was brought to the region in the 13th century.
45. Estonia lies close enough to the Arctic Circle that its shortest day lasts only about six hours – around Christmas. Its longest day, by contrast, stretches to about 18 hours and 40 minutes – around Midsummer in June.
46. Estonians have the longest paid maternity leave in the OECD – 435 days. What’s more, the benefit is paid at 100% of the parent’s average earnings from the previous year. The same principle can also apply to paternity leave, provided only one parent is on leave at a time.
47. It can snow in Estonia even in June, in the middle of summer. The last time it happened was in 2014 – and it certainly wasn’t the first.
48. Estonians invented their own sport – kiiking. In English it would translate as “swinging”, though not in the word’s traditional, sexual sense. It involves a swing with steel arms, enabling the rider to complete a full 360 degrees over the pivot point. In competition, the winner is the person who can swing over the fulcrum using the longest swing arms.
49. Estonia was the first country to introduce online voting, in 2005 – and in the most recent local elections at the time, in 2017, almost 17% of voters cast their ballots online.
50. Estonia was the first country in the world to launch e-residency – a programme that allows non-Estonians, including non-EU citizens, to access Estonia’s e-services. It enables them to establish an Estonian company and, through that, to operate within the EU single market, with access to services such as banking, payment processing and other business benefits associated with Estonia – and, by extension, the European Union.
51. The Indianapolis Colts’ defensive end Margus Hunt is Estonian, born in Karksi-Nuia. His nickname is the “Estonian Giant” – he’s 6 ft 8 in (2.03 m) tall – and he’s among the tallest players in the National Football League.
52. Mena Suvari, the American actress, is the daughter of a Greek mother and an Estonian father. She is best known for American Beauty, in which she starred opposite Kevin Spacey. Her father is from Pärnu, Estonia’s summer capital.
53. In Encino Man (1992), the American film starring Brendan Fraser, Sean Astin and Pauly Shore, the characters discover a caveman frozen in a back garden. After bringing him back to life, they introduce him as an exchange student from Estonia – presumably because “Estonia” sounded suitably exotic and ancient. In 1992, of course, many people outside Estonia still assumed it was a made-up country.
54. Media executives Lachlan Murdoch, Elisabeth Murdoch and James Murdoch all have Estonian roots through their mother, Anna Maria Murdoch Mann (née Tõrv), the daughter of Jacob Tõrv, an Estonian-born merchant seaman, and Sylvia Braida, a Scottish dry-cleaner. They are all children of the media magnate Rupert Murdoch.
55. The longest ice road in Europe – conditions permitting – is the Rohuküla–Heltermaa ice road, measuring 26.5 kilometres (16 miles) across a frozen stretch of the Baltic Sea. It links Rohuküla, a mainland port, with the island of Hiiumaa. The longest ice road ever recorded as originating from Estonia was, according to historical accounts, the route between Saaremaa and Lübeck (in present-day Germany) in 1323.
56. Estonia is a space nation. The country carried out its first space mission in 2013, when a tiny one-kilogramme satellite, ESTCube-1, was launched into orbit from the European Space Agency’s spaceport in French Guiana. Operating at an altitude of around 680 kilometres (423 miles), ESTCube-1 tested solar-sail technology, which scientists believe could one day help spacecraft travel faster and over greater distances.
57. The first meal consumed in space was prepared in Estonia. In 1962, a factory in Põltsamaa became a caterer to the Soviet space programme, packaging ready-made food in tin tubes – one of the few viable formats available at the time.
58. The world’s oldest rye variety still in cultivation is Sangaste rye. This hardy, high-yield, long-straw and frost-resistant strain was developed in 1875 by Count Friedrich Georg Magnus von Berg, the Baltic German owner of Sangaste Manor in Estonia. Years later, the same variety was developed in Canada as Kodiak rye and used to make Canadian Gold whisky.
59. Paiste, the world’s third-largest manufacturer of cymbals, gongs and metal percussion, was founded in 1906 by the Estonian musician Michail Toomas Paiste. His descendants still run the company, although it is now based in Switzerland. Paiste instruments have been used by rock legends including Roger Taylor, Phil Collins, Charlie Watts, Keith Moon, Mick Fleetwood, Jeff Porcaro, Larry Mullen Jr and Nick Mason.
60. In Japan, there is a manga character called Estonia. He is a supporting character in the series Hetalia: Axis Powers: a simple-looking boy with square glasses and a narrow face, dark-blond hair and blue eyes. He is portrayed as mild-mannered and upbeat, with good self-possession. He is skilled in information technology and economics and seems to get on well with most of the other “nations” (characters). However, he tends to work at his own pace and pay little attention to his surroundings, so he often goes unnoticed by others, despite his status as a top student.
61. The world’s first underwater draughts tournament was held in January 2011 in Valtu, near the Estonian town of Rapla. The event drew 52 Estonian divers and earned a place in the Guinness Book of Records.
62. Andrei Tarkovsky, the iconic Russian filmmaker, directed one of his films in Estonia: the science-fiction art film Stalker. The film – ranked 29th in the British Film Institute’s “50 Greatest Films of All Time” poll – was shot at two deserted hydroelectric plants on the Jägala River; at a former chemical factory in central Tallinn, next to the old Rotermann salt store; and at the power station now known as Kultuurikatel, a cultural centre. Some scenes were also filmed in Maardu, near the Iru power plant, and in Lasnamäe.
63. Neil Tennant, the singer of the Pet Shop Boys, was inspired to write a song called “Between Two Islands” after visiting Estonia. The lyrics refer to an “Island of Lovers” and an “Island of Whores”. In the summer of 2000, Tennant was staying at a small luxury resort on the island of Muhu when his host arranged a boat trip to a nearby island. A sudden, violent storm forced the party to abandon the excursion mid-journey and turn back for the safety of the resort – an unsettling experience that went on to inspire the song.
64. Estonians have one of the world’s largest collections of folk songs, with written records of around 133,000 of them.
65. The first jazz concert in the Soviet Union by an American artist took place in Estonia: in 1967, Charles Lloyd, Keith Jarrett, Ron McClure and Jack DeJohnette were allowed to perform at the Tallinn Jazz Festival. Their performance at the Kalev Sports Hall was recorded and later released by Lloyd as the album Charles Lloyd in the Soviet Union. After the concert, jazz festivals were banned in Soviet-occupied Estonia.
66. Estonia ranks fifth in the world for total opera performances per million residents.
67. The world’s first 3D animated film, The Souvenir, directed by Elbert Tuganov, was produced by Estonia’s Nukufilm – the oldest and largest stop-motion film studio in Northern Europe.
68. Pete Shelley, the singer-songwriter of the legendary English punk band Buzzcocks, married an Estonian-Canadian and moved to Estonia in 2009. In a 2013 interview, he said the couple had married a few years earlier and found their London flat increasingly cramped; after visiting relatives in Tallinn, he was struck by how “beautiful” and “tranquil” it felt compared with London’s late-night noise. He also noted that Tallinn is only a three-hour flight from the UK, so they did not feel cut off.
69. Marzipan is one of Estonia’s oldest sweets. It was originally used medicinally, as it was believed to have healing properties. There are still six marzipan painters in Estonia – thought to be among the last professional marzipan painters in Europe.
70. Raeapteek in Tallinn is Europe’s oldest town-hall pharmacy and the oldest continuously operating medical institution in Estonia.
71. Estonia’s first spa, offering mud treatments, was founded in Kuressaare in 1840. Today, there is roughly one spa for every ten residents in the town.
72. Louis Kahn, one of the 20th century’s most influential architects, was born in the Estonian town of Pärnu. He spent his early childhood on the island of Saaremaa before his family emigrated to the United States.
73. Estonia has the highest number of museums per capita in the world – roughly one museum for every 5,300 Estonians. On average, Estonians visit a museum twice a year.
74. Estonia has more coastal meadows than any other European country.
75. Estonia is not only home to Estonians. Other large ethnic groups include Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians and Finns, and the country is becoming increasingly diverse, attracting people from around the world. According to the 2011 census, Estonia is home to 180 different ethnic groups.
76. Tallinn Zoo has the world’s largest collection of rare chamois and wild sheep.
77. During the Soviet occupation, seatbelts for Soviet cars were manufactured at the Estonian company Norma. Their design was the brainchild of an Estonian engineer, Leonid Teder, who developed it in 1971.
78. Estonia is Europe’s largest exporter of wooden houses.
79. Tallinn Town Hall is Northern Europe’s only preserved Gothic city hall.
80. According to 2016 figures, Estonians are the world’s fifth keenest beer drinkers, consuming around 104 litres (220 US pints; 183 imperial pints) per person each year. More recently, Estonia has witnessed something of a beer revolution, with many small producers entering the market with inventive new brews – there are now 2,081 different beers brewed in the country.
81. Estonian general Johan Laidoner helped resolve the Turkish–Iraqi border dispute in 1925. As head of a League of Nations special mission to Iraq, he led a report that played an important role in demarcating the border between Turkey and Iraq.
82. According to legend, Odin, the chief god of the ancient Scandinavians, is buried on the Estonian island of Osmussaar. The island’s Swedish name, Odensholm, is said to derive from Odin’s name.
83. The world’s first modern refracting telescope is at Tartu Observatory. Built in 1824, it was, for a decade, the largest and finest of its kind in the world, and it remained in use for a hundred years.
84. Sterile rubber gloves and orthopaedic casts made of gypsum were first introduced in the 19th century at the University of Tartu’s Faculty of Medicine.
85. The world’s oldest compound eye was discovered in a 530-million-year-old fossil found in Estonia.
86. More than 50,000 Estonians – about 5% of the population – have a personal gene map, offering clues about hereditary disease risks as well as many other health conditions. The Estonian Genome Centre is also aiming to collect genetic data from 100,000 people and integrate it into everyday medical practice.
87. The covers of Guns N’ Roses’ hugely successful albums Use Your Illusion I and II were designed by Mark Kostabi, an Estonian-American artist and composer. With combined sales of around 35 million copies, it’s fair to say that Kostabi’s art has reached more people than that of any other Estonian artist.
88. Lactobacillus fermentum ME-3 – a bacterium discovered in 1995 by University of Tartu research teams led by Professors Marika Mikelsaar and Mihkel Zilmer – is considered unique for its combined antimicrobial and antioxidative effects. It supports human health by suppressing harmful microbes and contributing to overall wellbeing. ME-3 can be regarded as Estonia’s first probiotic lactic-acid bacterium, and an EU patent permits its use in the food industry in 15 European countries.
89. The Russian tsar Peter the Great reportedly said that, had he conquered Tallinn ten years earlier, he would not have needed St Petersburg. He visited Tallinn nine times and is said to have fallen in love with the city. His legacy includes a Baroque palace in Tallinn, Kadriorg (German: Catharinenthal), named in honour of his wife, Catherine I.
90. In the late 17th century, Russian Orthodox Old Believers fled to the shores of Lake Peipus in Estonia to escape religious persecution. Around 15,000 Old Believers still live in Estonia.
91. The Võru smoke-sauna tradition is listed on UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Known in the local dialect as suidsusannakombõ, it is an important part of everyday life in the Võru community, a population of around 75,000 in southern Estonia.
92. Estonia’s land area (45,227 square kilometres; 17,462 square miles) is larger than Taiwan’s (36,197 sq km; 13,976 sq mi), but Taiwan’s population (23.55 million) is many times greater than Estonia’s (1.316 million).
93. Linnahall, a former concert and events hall in Tallinn, is reportedly among the structures visible from space. Fans of the neglected building compare it to the ancient Babylonian ziggurats and Mexico’s Pyramid of the Sun.
94. One of the world’s most influential semioticians was Yuri Lotman, founder of the Tartu–Moscow Semiotic School. Born in Russia, but unable to secure an academic post in Leningrad (now St Petersburg) because of antisemitism, Lotman settled in Estonia in 1950 and worked at the University of Tartu for the rest of his career.
95. Roughly a fifth of the Soviet Union’s uranium – about 100,000 tonnes – was produced between 1946 and 1990 in the Estonian town of Sillamäe. Intended for both civilian and military use (including nuclear weapons), Sillamäe’s output was surpassed by only two other sites in the entire Soviet bloc.
96. According to the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) – a leading global measure of educational performance – Estonia’s 15-year-olds rank first in Europe and third in the world.
97. Karl Ernst von Baer, the renowned naturalist and biologist, was born in Estonia to a Baltic German noble family. He is regarded as a founding father of embryology, having discovered the mammalian ovum in 1826.
98. Estonia once manufactured cars. Between 1957 and 1999, a Tallinn-based state-owned factory called TARK produced more than 1,300 vehicles, designed along the lines of Formula 3 racing cars. Another factory in Tartu also built vans and minibuses – though these were closer to shoeboxes on wheels than anything you’d call sleek.
99. When Estonians want to say something is good, they’ll often describe it as “normal”.
100. Despite being pushed around by foreign powers for centuries, Estonians have managed to endure – and ultimately to build a rather decent independent state.
Please note that this article was originally published on 23 February 2018 and lightly amended on 23 February 2026.
