According to the most recent 2021 Canadian census, the population of Baffin Island was 13,039. It had one of the lowest population densities in the world, about 0.03 people per square kilometer. The population of Baffin island accounts for more than 67 percent of the people in the Qikiqtaaluk region and more than a third of the population of the territory of Nunavut. The culture census of 2016 determined that about three-quarters of the population was considered to be indigenous people, and the quarter that remained were non-indigenous. This is different from Nunavut as a whole, as more than 88% of the population is considered indigenous. The lower percentage of the indigenous people found on Baffin island results from the capital city of Iqaluit, which has many foreigners.
Baffin Island is the largest island in Canada and is considered the fifth-largest island in the world. It is comparable to Spain, where Baffin island is slightly larger. The indigenous name for the island is Qikiqtaaluk, which translates to a very big island. The name is used for the administrative region of the island, as well as multiple places for the rest of the Northwest Territories and Nunavut. Norse explorers who had first visited the region referred to Baffin Island as Helluland, which translates to stone land. The original name of the island was given in 1576 when an English explorer, Martin Frobisher, landed on the island. He had called it Queen Elizabeth's Foreland and named Frobisher Bay after himself. Eventually, the official name of the island was Baffin Island, given in 1616 after the English explorer William Baffin who came across the island while trying to look for the Northwest Passage.
Baffin Island is home to many species of flora and fauna that cannot be found anywhere else. For example, polar bears can be found along the coast of the island and they are the most populous where the sea ice takes form into pack ice. The food sources for the polar bears are ringed-seals and bearded seals. Polar bears mate once every year, producing as little as one cub and up to three cubs.
The area also contains beautiful Arctic foxes which are found near polar bears, often following them when they are searching for seals. This is because foxes are notorious scavengers, and wait until the polar bears have successfully hunted and fed before coming in to consume the rest of the carcass. Rare Arctic Wolves are year-round residents of the island. They do not hunt in packs, but male-female pairs often travel and hunt together.
Baffin Island is known for being the film set for the famous movie, The White Dawn, which was shot in 1974. It is widely known that the majority of the cast were Inuits who spoke the native language. Baffin Island is home to a rich mineral deposit of kimberlite pipes of diamond-bearing kimberlite.