The Federal Republic of Nigeria, normally referred to as Nigeria, is a federal republic in West Africa, bordering Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in the north. Its coast in the south lies on the Gulf of Guinea in the Atlantic Ocean. 

It includes 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, exactly where the capital, Abuja is found. Nigeria is officially a democratic secular region.

Nigeria has been household to a amount of kingdoms and tribal states about the millennia. The contemporary condition originated from British colonial rule starting in the nineteenth century, and took its current territorial form with the merging of the Southern Nigeria Protectorate and Northern Nigeria Protectorate in 1914. 

The British established up administrative and authorized constructions even though practising indirect rule through conventional chiefdoms. Nigeria turned a formally independent federation in 1960. It professional a civil war from 1967 to 1970. 

It thereafter alternated involving democratically elected civilian governments and armed forces dictatorships until finally it attained a secure democracy in 1999, with the 2011 presidential election thought of the initial to be moderately free of charge and honest.

Nigeria is normally referred to as the "Huge of Africa", owing to its massive inhabitants and overall economy. With 186 million inhabitants, Nigeria is the most populous state in Africa and the seventh most populous country in the globe. 

Nigeria has the 3rd-biggest youth populace in the world, immediately after India and China, with extra than 90 million of its inhabitants less than age 18. The place is seen as a multinational state as it is inhabited by around 500 ethnic teams, of which the 3 premier are the Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba these ethnic groups talk in excess of 500 diverse languages and are identified with a extensive assortment of cultures.

The formal language is English. Nigeria is divided roughly in half between Christians, who are living typically in the southern portion of the nation, and Muslims, who stay mostly in the north. A minority of the inhabitants practise religions indigenous to Nigeria, this sort of as individuals indigenous to the Igbo and Yoruba ethnicities.

Nigeria, an African place on the Gulf of Guinea, has several natural landmarks and wildlife reserves. Guarded parts these kinds of as Cross River Countrywide Park and Yankari National Park have waterfalls, dense rainforest, savanna and uncommon primate habitats. 

A single of the most recognizable web pages is Zuma Rock, a 725m-tall monolith outside the cash of Abuja that’s pictured on the national currency.