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Home Explore Kāpiti Recreation Kāpiti Island

Kāpiti Island

Kāpiti Island lies five kilometres off the Kāpiti coastline. The island is an internationally famed nature reserve protecting some of Aotearoa New Zealand's most endangered birds. The 1,965-hectare island is one of the few relatively accessible island nature reserves in the country and is one of Aotearoa New Zealand’s pre-eminent sites for bird recovery.

The island, currently administered by the Department of Conservation, is the summit of a submerged mountain range created by an earthquake 200 million years ago.

It was first identified by naturalists as a possible bird sanctuary as early as 1870 and has been reserved for this purpose since 1897.

Find out how to arrange a visit to the island, and conditions of entry, on the Department of Conservation website.

For more information on Kāpiti Island, as well as other activities to do around Kāpiti, visit the WellingtonNZ.com website, Kāpiti Island.

Visitor register

The Kāpiti Island visitor register shows intended visits to the island.

The visitor registers for Kāpiti Island are in PDF format and available for download or print.

Updated 7 August 2024