Twin town

Twin towns are towns or cities in different countries which are paired to encourage human contact and cultural links.

In Europe, the pairs of towns are called twin towns, but other languages say friendship towns or partner towns; in North America and Australasia, the towns are called sister cities. Brother cities was the name of twinned cities in the old Soviet bloc.

Twin towns often (but not always) have similar populations, industries and other characteristics. Sometimes, even larger areas enter into "twinning" agreements, such as that between the provinces of Hainan in China and Jeju in South Korea.