Macaronesia is a modern collective name for several groups of islands in the North Atlantic Ocean near Europe and North Africa belonging to three countries: Portugal, Spain, and Cape Verde.The name (which is often misspelled 'Macronesia') comes from the Greek for "islands of the fortunate" μακάρων νῆσοι makárōn nêsoi, a term used by Ancient Greek geographers for islands to the west of the Straits of Gibraltar.

Macaronesia consists of five archipelagos:

The islands of Macaronesia are volcanic in origin, and are thought to be the product of several geologic hotspots.

The climate of the Macaronesian islands ranges from mediterranean in the Azores and Madeira to arid in Cape Verde. The Portuguese archipelagos of the Azores and Madeira have a generally cooler climate and higher rainfall than the Canaries and Cape Verde. The laurisilva forests of Macaronesia are a type of mountain cloud forest with relicts species of a vegetation type which originally covered much of the Mediterranean Basin when the climate of the region was more humid and evolved to adapt in islanders conditions.