New Guinea is the world's second largest island, after Greenland

Greenland

Greenland is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark, located between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Though physiographically a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe for...

, covering a land area of 786,000 km². Located in the southwest Pacific Ocean

Pacific Ocean

The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...

, it lies geographically to the east of the Malay Archipelago

Malay Archipelago

The Malay Archipelago refers to the archipelago between mainland Southeastern Asia and Australia. The name was derived from the anachronistic concept of a Malay race....

, with which it is sometimes included as part of a greater Indo-Australian Archipelago. Geologically it is a part of the same tectonic plate and when world sea levels are low shares shorelines (which now lie 100 to 140 metres below sea level.) combining with Australia and lands now inundated into the tectonic continent of Sahul

Sahul Shelf

The Sahul Shelf is part of the continental shelf of Sahul and lies off the coast of Australia. The Sahul Shelf proper stretches northwest from Australia much of the way under the Timor Sea towards Timor, ending where the seabed begins descending into the Timor Trough...

,
name="Allen 1977"> also known as Greater Australia.