Mauna Kea is the tallest mountain on Earth — it rises 9,330 m from its base on the Pacific floor, comfortably more than Everest's entire height above the sea — and it is not on this list. Neither is Chimborazo, whose summit sits farther from the centre of the Earth than any other point. This countdown measures one thing only: elevation above mean sea level, running from 8,849 m at the top to 7,952 m in fifteenth place, across Nepal, China, Pakistan and India. A second rule matters just as much. A mountain has to be independent, clearing the standard 500 m of topographic prominence, which is why Lhotse qualifies on 610 m while six summits above 8,370 m do not. Yalung Kang, Kangchenjunga South and Lhotse Middle are all higher than most peaks here, but they are shoulders of Kangchenjunga and Lhotse rather than mountains in their own right.
15 Tallest Mountains in the World (2026)
The record The tallest mountain in the world is Mount Everest, in Nepal and China — 8,849 m (29,032 ft), elevation above sea level. Source: Wikipedia (List of highest mountains on Earth) + 2020 China-Nepal joint survey. Verified .
Tallest Mountains in the World The Ranking at a Glance
Fun Facts About the World's Tallest Mountains
- Fourteen and no more. Only fourteen mountains on Earth top 8,000 m, and every one of them stands in the Himalaya or the Karakoram. Shishapangma is the lowest of them at 8,027 m.
- A 48-metre near miss. Gyachung Kang falls just 48 m short of 8,000 m, which makes it the highest mountain on Earth that is not an eight-thousander.
- A dead heat settled by prominence. Gasherbrum III matches Gyachung Kang's 7,952 m exactly, but with only 461 m of prominence it counts as a subpeak of Gasherbrum II rather than a mountain in its own right.
- The fourth-highest almost failed the test. Lhotse clears the 500 m independence rule by only 110 m, because the saddle joining it to Everest sits so high.
- First climbed, and long the deadliest. Annapurna I was the first eight-thousander ever summited, in 1950, and for decades afterwards it carried the worst ratio of deaths to successful ascents of any of them.
- Everest is still rising. Mount Everest gains a few millimetres a year as the Indian plate drives north into Asia.
1. Mount Everest
At 8,849 m 29,032 ft, Mount Everest is the highest point on the surface of the Earth. The 2020 joint survey by China and Nepal fixed it at 8,848.86 m, the figure both governments now use, settling decades of competing numbers. It straddles the border between Nepal's Khumbu region and Tibet and carries a name on each side — Sagarmatha in Nepali, Chomolungma in Tibetan. The English name honours George Everest, a nineteenth-century Surveyor General of India who never saw the peak and objected to the honour on the grounds that his name could not be written in Hindi or Persian.
Two routes carry almost all the traffic: the South Col from Nepal and the North Ridge from Tibet. Both spend their final hours in the death zone above 8,000 m, where the air holds roughly a third of the oxygen available at sea level and the body deteriorates faster than it can recover. Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary reached the summit in May 1953. The mountain is still rising a few millimetres a year as the Indian plate drives north into Asia.
2. K2
At 8,611 m 28,251 ft, K2 is the second-highest mountain on Earth and by a wide margin the hardest of the fourteen eight-thousanders to climb. It rises at the head of the Baltoro Glacier on the border between Pakistan's Gilgit-Baltistan and China's Xinjiang. Its name is a survey label — the second peak catalogued in the Karakoram — that simply stuck, because no local name was in common use along the approach.
There is no easy line on K2. Every route is steep, exposed and technically sustained from low down, and Karakoram weather is markedly worse than anything in the Himalaya. An Italian team put Achille Compagnoni and Lino Lacedelli on top in 1954, but the summit went unreached in winter until January 2021, when a team of ten Nepali climbers completed the last unclaimed winter first ascent of an eight-thousander.
3. Kangchenjunga
At 8,586 m 28,169 ft, Kangchenjunga was believed to be the highest mountain in the world until surveyors of the Great Trigonometrical Survey recalculated Everest in the 1850s. It sits on the border between Nepal's Koshi Province and the Indian state of Sikkim, and its 3,922 m of topographic prominence make it one of the most independent great peaks anywhere — a genuinely free-standing massif rather than a high point on somebody else's ridge.
The name translates roughly as the five treasuries of the great snow, for the five summits along its crest. Kangchenjunga is sacred in Sikkim, and the tradition established by Joe Brown and George Band on the first ascent in 1955 still holds: climbers stop a few metres below the true summit and leave the top itself untrodden.
4. Lhotse
At 8,516 m 27,940 ft, Lhotse is the fourth-highest mountain in the world and the clearest illustration of why this list needs a prominence rule at all. Its 610 m of prominence only just clears the 500 m bar, because Lhotse shares the South Col with Everest and that connecting saddle sits very high. A slightly stricter threshold would remove the fourth-highest mountain on Earth from the count altogether.
The name means south peak in Tibetan, a plain description of its position relative to Everest. Climbers on both mountains share an approach through the Khumbu Icefall and the Western Cwm before the routes diverge, and the Lhotse Face — an enormous sheet of blue ice running up towards the South Col — is fixed with rope every season. A Swiss team made the first ascent in 1956.
5. Makalu
At 8,485 m 27,838 ft, Makalu stands about 19 km southeast of Everest and is one of the most distinctive shapes in the Himalaya: a near-perfect four-sided pyramid with sharp ridges dividing four steep faces. It sits on the Nepal-China border inside Makalu Barun National Park, which protects one of the least disturbed valley systems in the entire range.
Isolation is central to the mountain's reputation. The final pyramid is steep and exposed on every side, and the standard route finishes with genuine technical climbing at altitude rather than a long snow plod. Lionel Terray and Jean Couzy of a French expedition reached the top in 1955.
6. Cho Oyu
At 8,188 m 26,864 ft, Cho Oyu is generally regarded as the most straightforward of the eight-thousanders, which has made it the usual proving ground for climbers preparing for Everest. It lies about 20 km west of Everest on the Nepal-China border, and its standard northwest route is a comparatively gentle snow climb with no sustained technical difficulty.
The name is usually translated as turquoise goddess, for the colour the face takes in certain light. Just west of the mountain, the Nangpa La has carried trade between Tibet and the Khumbu for centuries, and the pass remains one of the great historic crossings of the Himalaya. An Austrian expedition made the first ascent in 1954.
7. Dhaulagiri I
At 8,167 m 26,795 ft, Dhaulagiri I is the highest mountain lying entirely within the borders of a single country, and it once held a grander title. After a survey measured it in 1808 it was taken to be the highest mountain in the world, a position it kept for three decades until Kangchenjunga displaced it in 1838.
The name comes from Sanskrit and means dazzling white mountain. Its south and west faces are enormous and still rarely climbed. The Kali Gandaki gorge separating Dhaulagiri from Annapurna to the east is described as the world's deepest, and the mountain rises some 7,000 m above the river 30 km to the southeast. A Swiss-Austrian expedition made the first ascent in 1960.
8. Manaslu
At 8,163 m 26,781 ft, Manaslu is the eighth-highest mountain in the world and the high point of the Nepalese Himalaya west of the Annapurna range. Its name derives from a Sanskrit word for intellect or soul, usually rendered as mountain of the spirit, and its long summit ridge is visible from a great distance across the Gorkha district.
A Japanese expedition put Toshio Imanishi and Gyalzen Norbu on the summit in 1956, and the mountain has kept a strong Japanese association ever since. The Manaslu Circuit, which loops around the massif through Buddhist villages and over the Larkya La, has become one of Nepal's popular long treks for walkers with no intention of climbing anything at all.
9. Nanga Parbat
At 8,126 m 26,660 ft, Nanga Parbat anchors the western end of the Himalaya, standing alone above the Indus valley in Pakistan's Gilgit-Baltistan. Its 4,608 m of prominence are among the greatest of any mountain on Earth, and the Rupal Face on its southern side rises roughly 4,600 m above its base, making it one of the largest mountain walls anywhere.
The peak's reputation was made by a long run of disasters on pre-war German expeditions, which earned it the name killer mountain. Hermann Buhl finally reached the summit alone in 1953 after a forty-hour push without supplementary oxygen, having carried on after his partners turned back. It remains one of the most extraordinary single efforts in mountaineering.
10. Annapurna I
At 8,091 m 26,545 ft, Annapurna I was the first eight-thousander ever climbed, three years ahead of Everest. Maurice Herzog and Louis Lachenal of a French expedition reached the summit in June 1950, and both paid for it with severe frostbite during a desperate descent.
It is also among the deadliest of the fourteen. For decades Annapurna I held the highest ratio of deaths to successful ascents of any eight-thousander, and it still ranks alongside K2 and Nanga Parbat as one of the most dangerous, largely because both the south face and the standard north-side route are exposed to serious avalanche risk. The name comes from a Sanskrit word meaning full of food, an epithet of a Hindu goddess of harvests. The Annapurna Circuit around the massif remains one of the best-known treks in the world.
11. Gasherbrum I
At 8,080 m 26,510 ft, Gasherbrum I is the eleventh-highest mountain on Earth and the second-highest in the Karakoram after K2. It is also known as Hidden Peak, a name earned by its position deep in the Baltoro Muztagh, set far enough back up the glacier system that it cannot be seen from the usual approach.
The mountain sits on the Pakistan-China border surrounded by the other Gasherbrum peaks. An American expedition made the first ascent in 1958, and in 1975 Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler climbed it in pure alpine style — no fixed rope, no chain of pre-stocked camps, no supplementary oxygen — which permanently changed what climbers believed was possible at that altitude.
12. Broad Peak
At 8,051 m 26,414 ft, Broad Peak takes its name from the sheer width of its summit crest, which runs for more than a kilometre above 8,000 m. It stands only about 8 km from K2 on the same side of the Baltoro Glacier, and the two are usually seen together from Concordia, the junction of glaciers that draws trekkers from across the world.
The breadth that gives the mountain its name also makes it treacherous. Climbers who reach the first high point on the ridge have not reached the top: the true summit lies farther along a corniced crest, and that distinction has caught out a number of expeditions who believed they had finished. Hermann Buhl, Kurt Diemberger, Marcus Schmuck and Fritz Wintersteller made the first ascent in 1957 without supplementary oxygen or high-altitude porters.
13. Gasherbrum II
At 8,035 m 26,362 ft, Gasherbrum II is the thirteenth-highest mountain in the world and, in Karakoram terms, one of the more approachable. Its standard southwest ridge is moderate by the standards of a range where most routes are severe, and it has become the introduction to 8,000 m climbing for people who would not consider K2 or Gasherbrum I.
It shares the Pakistan-China border and the upper Baltoro glacier system with its neighbours, and the whole Gasherbrum group takes its name from a Balti phrase usually translated as beautiful mountain. An Austrian team made the first ascent in 1956, and in February 2011 Simone Moro, Denis Urubko and Cory Richards made the first winter ascent of the mountain.
14. Shishapangma
At 8,027 m 26,335 ft, Shishapangma is the lowest of the fourteen eight-thousanders and the only one lying entirely inside Tibet, well north of the Nepalese border in the Jugal Himalaya. That position explains why it was the last of the fourteen to be climbed. Chinese authorities did not open the region to foreign expeditions until 1980, so a Chinese team made the first ascent in 1964 without any outside competition.
Because the summit sits at the end of a long, gently rising snow ridge, Shishapangma has a well-known central high point a little short of the true top, and a number of recorded ascents stopped there. Its northern approach is unusually gentle for a mountain of this size, with vehicle access reaching far onto the Tibetan plateau before the walking begins.
15. Gyachung Kang
At 7,952 m 26,089 ft, Gyachung Kang is the highest mountain on Earth that falls short of the 8,000 m mark, missing it by just 48 m. It sits between Everest and Cho Oyu on the Nepal-China border, and its 700 m of prominence comfortably clear the independence rule that keeps far higher subsidiary summits off this list.
It shares that height exactly with Gasherbrum III in the Karakoram, but Gasherbrum III has only 461 m of prominence and is therefore counted as a subpeak of Gasherbrum II rather than a mountain in its own right — which is precisely why Gyachung Kang takes fifteenth place here and Gasherbrum III does not appear at all. The near-miss below 8,000 m has kept Gyachung Kang almost free of traffic, since Himalayan expeditions are overwhelmingly organised around the fourteen peaks above the mark. A Japanese expedition made the first ascent in 1964.
FAQ: The World's Tallest Mountains
What is the tallest mountain in the world?
Mount Everest, at 8,849 m 29,032 ft above sea level, is the highest point on Earth and takes first place here. Measured a different way the answer changes: Hawaii's Mauna Kea rises 9,330 m from its base on the ocean floor, which makes it the tallest mountain in the world from bottom to top.
What is the difference between the tallest and the highest mountain?
Height above sea level is the standard measure, and the one this list uses, so Everest ranks first. Tallest taken strictly means base-to-summit rise, which favours Mauna Kea. A third measure, distance from the centre of the Earth, favours Ecuador's Chimborazo, because the planet bulges at the equator.
How many mountains are higher than 8,000 metres?
Fourteen, and every one of them stands in the Himalaya or the Karakoram. Climbers call them the eight-thousanders, and they fill the first fourteen places on this list. Fifteenth-placed Gyachung Kang misses the mark by 48 m, which makes it the highest mountain on Earth to fall short of it.
Which countries have the most of the world's tallest mountains?
All fifteen lie in just four countries. Ten touch China and nine touch Nepal, an overlap explained by the long stretch of border the two share along the Himalayan crest. Pakistan holds five, all of them in the Karakoram, and India shares Kangchenjunga with Nepal.
What is the highest mountain outside Asia?
Aconcagua in Argentina, at 6,967 m 22,858 ft, is the highest peak outside Asia and the highest in both the Western and Southern Hemispheres. It is not remotely close to this list — it would need almost another 1,000 m to reach fifteenth place.
Planning more of your trip? Keep exploring more world record-breakers.