Singapore packs a full country into an island you can drive across in under an hour. Here is what is actually worth knowing before you go, from where the name came from to the laws that catch visitors out. If you are still working out the trip itself, Singapore tour packages are a good place to start.
Singapore at a Glance
| Full name | Republic of Singapore |
| Land area | 744 sq km, a little under half the size of Delhi |
| Population | About 6.1 million |
| Official languages | English, Mandarin, Malay and Tamil. Malay is the national language |
| Currency | Singapore dollar (SGD) |
| Time zone | UTC+8, which is 2 hours 30 minutes ahead of India |
| Government | Unitary parliamentary republic |
| Independent since | 9 August 1965 |
| Highest natural point | Bukit Timah Hill, 164 metres |
| Visa for Indians | Needed in advance, applied for through an authorised agent. See our Singapore visa guide |
Where the Name Comes From
Singapore comes from the Sanskrit singa, meaning lion, and pura, meaning city. The story goes that a Srivijayan prince, Sang Nila Utama, landed on the island and saw an animal he took for a lion, which is unlikely given that lions have never lived there. Tigers did.
The Merlion, the mascot you will queue to photograph at Marina Bay, keeps the legend going: half lion for the name, half fish for the fishing village the island once was.
A Country That Did Not Ask to Be One
Singapore is one of very few countries to become independent against its own wishes. There was no war and no uprising. In 1965 the Malaysian parliament voted 126 to nil to separate Singapore from the federation, and Singapore was a sovereign state whether it wanted to be or not. Lee Kuan Yew announced it on television in tears.
It is also one of only three modern city-states in the world, alongside Monaco and Vatican City.
Small, and Mostly Flat
At 744 square kilometres, Singapore is among the twenty smallest countries on earth, and a good deal of that land did not exist a century ago. Reclamation has added roughly a quarter of it.
It is not one island either, but a main island plus more than sixty smaller ones, from Sentosa to the barely inhabited Southern Islands. The highest natural point in the whole country is Bukit Timah Hill at 164 metres, which is shorter than plenty of the buildings around it.
Speaking of which, there is a 280 metre cap on building height, set to keep the airspace clear for Changi. Tanjong Pagar Centre needed special permission to reach 290 metres, which makes it the tallest building in the country.
Four Languages, and Then Singlish
English, Mandarin, Malay and Tamil are all official. Malay is the national language, which is why the anthem, Majulah Singapura, is sung in Malay by plenty of people who do not otherwise speak it.
What you will actually hear on the street is Singlish, an English creole that borrows freely from all four. It is established enough that the Oxford English Dictionary has adopted several of its words, shiok and lah among them.
The Rules Visitors Do Not Expect
Chewing gum has not been sold in Singapore since 1992. You will not be arrested for chewing it, but you cannot buy it, and only pharmacies can supply the therapeutic kinds.
Littering starts at SGD 300 for a small item and climbs steeply from there, with community service in a bright vest for repeat offenders. There is a law requiring you to flush a public toilet, and the country cared enough about sanitation to table the UN resolution that created World Toilet Day.
Caning remains a legal punishment for a list of offences. And owning a car means bidding for a Certificate of Entitlement that can cost more than the car itself, which is entirely deliberate: the government would much rather you took the MRT.
Hawker Food Is Official World Heritage
In 2020 UNESCO added Singapore’s hawker culture to its list of Intangible Cultural Heritage, which puts open-air food courts in the same category as flamenco and Neapolitan pizza making.
Chinatown Complex is the one to head for, with hundreds of stalls and a Michelin-recognised chicken rice hawker among them. For a drink, the Singapore Sling was invented at the Long Bar in Raffles, where you are expected to drop your peanut shells on the floor while you have one. More on where to eat in our guide to street food in Singapore.
Records It Actually Holds
The Rain Vortex at Jewel Changi is the tallest indoor waterfall in the world at 40 metres, and it is free to walk up to. Changi itself runs free cinemas around the clock in Terminals 2 and 3, which makes a long layover considerably less painful.
The Singapore Grand Prix was the first Formula 1 night race ever held. Night Safari was the world’s first nocturnal wildlife park. And the National Stadium has the largest retractable dome anywhere, 312 metres across.
A City That Grows on Itself
Roughly half of Singapore sits under green cover, which is remarkable for somewhere this dense, and it is policy rather than luck. There is a national tree planting day every November, and HortPark was the first park in the world built specifically around gardening.
Wildlife hangs on in the middle of it. Sunda pangolins still live in the Central Catchment Nature Reserve, minutes from an expressway, and each one eats its way through thousands of ants and termites a night.
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