Panama, officially the Republic of Panama, is a country located at the southern end of Central America, bordering South America. It is bordered by Costa Rica to the west, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the south. Its capital and largest city is Panama City, whose metropolitan area is home to nearly half of the country's over 4 million inhabitants.

Before the arrival of Spanish colonists in the 16th century, Panama was inhabited by a number of different indigenous tribes. It broke away from Spain in 1821 and joined the Republic of Gran Colombia, a union of Nueva Granada, Ecuador, and Venezuela. After Gran Colombia dissolved in 1831, Panama and Nueva Granada eventually became the Republic of Colombia. With the backing of the United States, Panama seceded from Colombia in 1903, allowing the construction of the Panama Canal to be completed by the United States Army Corps of Engineers between 1904 and 1914. The 1977 Torrijos–Carter Treaties agreed to transfer the canal from the United States to Panama on December 31, 1999. The surrounding territory was returned first, in 1979.

Revenue from canal tolls has continued to represent a significant portion of Panama's GDP, especially after the Panama Canal expansion project (finished in 2016) doubled its capacity. Commerce, banking, and tourism are major sectors. Panama is regarded as having a high-income economy. In 2019, Panama ranked 57th in the world in terms of the Human Development Index. In 2018, Panama was ranked the seventh-most competitive economy in Latin America, according to the World Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Index. Panama was ranked 82nd in the Global Innovation Index in 2024. Covering around 40 percent of its land area, Panama's jungles are home to an abundance of tropical plants and animals – some of them found nowhere else on Earth.

Panama is a founding member of the United Nations and other international organizations such as the Organization of American States, Latin America Integration Association, Group of 77, World Health Organization, and Non-Aligned Movement.

The exact origin of the name "Panama" remains uncertain, with several theories proposed.

A widely recounted legend holds that "Panamá" was the name of a fishing village encountered by Spanish colonists, purportedly meaning "abundance of fish." While the precise location of this village is unknown, the legend is often associated with accounts from Spanish explorer Antonio Tello de Guzmán, who in 1515 described landing at an unnamed indigenous fishing village along the Pacific coast. Subsequently, in 1517, Spanish lieutenant Gaspar de Espinosa established a trading post at the site, and in 1519, Pedro Arias Dávila founded Panama City there, replacing the earlier settlement of Santa María la Antigua del Darién.

The Isthmus of Panama was formed about three million years ago when the land bridge between North and South America finally became complete, and plants and animals gradually crossed it in both directions. The existence of the isthmus affected the dispersal of people, agriculture and technology throughout the Americas from the appearance of the first hunters and collectors to the era of villages and cities.

The earliest discovered artifacts of indigenous peoples in Panama include Paleo-Indian projectile points. Later central Panama was home to some of the first pottery-making in the Americas, for example the cultures at Monagrillo, which date back to 2500–1700 BC. These evolved into significant populations best known through their spectacular burials (dating to c. 500–900 AD) at the Monagrillo archaeological site, and their Gran Coclé style polychrome pottery. The monumental monolithic sculptures at the Barriles (Chiriqui) site are also important traces of these ancient isthmian cultures.