Europe
To which language should you translate to localize in Iceland?
Introduction
Language
Official language
Icelandic 93%
Other languages
Polish 2.71%, Lithuanian 0.43%, English 0.32%, German 0.31%, Danish 0.31%
T-index
0.025%
T-Index ranks countries according to their potential for online sales.
Demography
Capital: Reykjavik
Currency: Icelandic króna
Population: 372,52 thousands
Population density: 4/km2
Economy
GDP: 25.6 billion USD (2021)
GDP per capita: 68,727.6 USD (2021)
Exports: $5.18 billion (2020)
Statistics
Internet users: 99% penetration, 340.9 thousand
Unemployment rate: 6% (2021)
Urbanisation: 93.86% (2018)
Literacy: 99% (2020)
Conventions
Numbering system
Arabic numerals with comma as decimal separator
Date format: dd-mm-yyyy
Time: 24h time system
Country code: 00354
Language data sources: Worldatlas/Britannica//EF/Wikipedia; Demography data sources: IMF/Worldometers; Conventions data source: Wikipedia; Economy data sources: WTO/OEC/CIA/Esomar/Datareportal; Statistics data sources: Datareportal/WorldBank/UN/UNESCO/CEIC/IMF/Culturalatlas/Commisceoglobal
Facts and data
Economy
Imports
$5.71 billion (2020). Aluminium Oxide ($455M), Refined Petroleum ($304M), Carbon-based Electronics ($283M), Cars ($272M), and Packaged Medicaments ($187M), importing mostly from Netherlands ($621M), Denmark ($565M), Norway ($490M), Germany ($485M), and United Kingdom ($371M).
Ease of doing business
It is very easy to conduct business (rated 79 out of 100) ranked 16th out of 44 OECD high income countries in ranked 30th out of 190 countries worldwide (2022, World Bank)
Economic freedom
‘Mostly free’ (77 out of 100) ranked 9th out of 45 European countries ranked 13th out of 186 countries worldwide (2022, Heritage Foundation and Wall Street Journal)
Exports
$298 billion (2020). Raw Aluminium ($1.74B), Fish Fillets ($984M), Non-fillet Fresh Fish ($336M), Non-fillet Frozen Fish ($283M), and Processed Fish ($264M), exporting mostly to Netherlands ($931M), Spain ($796M), United Kingdom ($517M), Germany ($460M), and United States ($372M).
Global Innovation Index
Ranked 20th out of 39 European countries, 12th out of 132 worldwide.
The Global Innovation Index captures the innovation
ecosystem performance of 132 economies and tracks the most recent global innovation trends.
Economy data sources: WTO/OEC/CIA/Esomar/Datareportal
Service Imports (2017)
Source: OEC
Service Exports (2017)
Source: OEC
Most complex products by PCI
Product Complexity Index measures the knowledge intensity of a product by considering the knowledge intensity of its exporters
Source: OEC
Most specialised products by RCA Index
Specialisation is measured using Revealed Comparative Advantage, an index that takes the ratio between Iceland observed and expected exports in each product
Source: OEC
Export Opportunities by Relatedness
Relatedness measures the distance between a country's current exports and each product, the barchart show only products that Iceland is not specialized in
Source: OEC

T-index
Reach most of the online purchasing power
T-Index ranks countries according to their potential for online sales. It estimates the market share of each country in relation to global e-commerce.
Try it nowMedia
Media language Icelandic, English
Information channels
National public radio and TV is provided by the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service (RUV), which is owned by the state. The RUV is tasked with promoting the Icelandic language and culture. It is funded from a licence fee and advertising revenue. Media ownership is highly concentrated. The 365 company runs the main private TV and radio stations and the highest-circulating newspaper, Frettabladid. The constitution guarantees “absolute” press freedom, but the situation for journalists has worsened in recent years because of poor relations between politicians and the media, says Reporters Without Borders. Legislation passed in 2010 aims to give more protection to journalists and whistleblowers than any other such law in the world. Around 50% of Icelanders get their news online, a media consumption poll found in 2018. It said very few young people use traditional media to follow current events. By the end of 2017, 99% of Icelanders were online (Internetworldstats).
The press
Frettabladid – daily, distributed free-of-charge
Morgunbladid – morning daily
DV – evening daily
Vidskiptabladid – business
Baejarins besta – West Fjords local news
icelandreview.com– English-language site with news
Stundin – news site, known for investigative reporting
Kjarninn – website known for news analysis
Television
Icelandic National Broadcasting Service – operates public network Sjonvarpid
Stod 2 – main private station
Skjar einn – private
Radio
Icelandic National Broadcasting Service – public radio, operates two national networks and four regional stations
Bylgjan – main private station
Media data source: BBC
Internet Data
Internet users
99% penetration, 340.9 thousand
Share of web traffic by device
36.76% mobile phones, 61.02% computers (laptops and desktops), 2.20% tablet devices, others 0.02%
Mobile connection as a percentage of total population: 139%
Percentage of mobile connections that are broadband (3G-5G): 92.7%
Most popular web search engines
Google (94.14%), Bing (3.51%), Duckduckgo (1.09%), Yahoo (0.77%), Yandex (0.22%), Ecosia (0.17%)
Most used social media
Facebook (78.05%), Instagram (7.32%), Twitter (5.64%), Pinterest (6.15%), Reddit (1.23%), YouTube (0.98%)
internet data sources: Datareportal/Statcounter
Social statistics
Life expectancy
83 yrs (2020)
Average age of the population
44.9 yrs (2020)
Healthcare expenditure
8.64% of GDP (2018)
Glass Ceiling Index
78.7 out 100, ranked 2nd out of 29 countries.
The glass-ceiling index measures the environment for working women combining data on higher education, labor-force participation, pay, child-care costs, maternity and paternity rights, business-school applications, and representation in senior jobs.
Social statistics sources: WorldBank/UN/UNESCO/CEIC/IMF
The Data Factbook is a work in progress project. Our community is helping us to fill it up always with new and updated data. Your contribution is precious. If you want to help us, please write your advices at imminent@translated.com
Languages research
Languages and dialects spoken in Iceland

The geographical distribution of languages that you will find in the maps published in this section is a work in progress. Our community is helping us to fill it up with always new and updated data. Your contribution is precious. If you want to help us, please write to imminent.factbook@translated.com
Photo credit: Evelyn Paris, Unsplash