German
- Heinrich Barth (1821-1865)
- Explored the North Africa coast and the Sahara Desert and established the exact course of the Niger River (1844-1855)
- Aimé Bonpland (1773-1858)
- See: Friedrich Heinrich Alexander von Humboldt
- Wilhelm Filchner (1877-1957)
- Made an expedition into the Wedell Sea of Antarctica (1911)
- Conducted cartographic surveys and magnetic observations in Tibet (1926-1929)
- Friedrich Heinrich Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859)
- With Aimé Bonpland, explored the regions of the Orinoco and Amazon Rivers and gathered 60,000 plant specimens (1800-1804)
- Otto von Kotzebue (1787-1846)
- Sailed via Cape Horn to Easter Island and other Pacific islands and to Alaska where he charted the northwest coast (1815)
- Circumnavigated the world (1823-1826)
- Ferdinand von Richthofen (1833-1905)
- Carried out extensive studies in China (1867-1870)
- Explored Java, Thailand, Burma, Japan, and California
- Gerhard Rohlfs (1831-1896)
- First European to cross Africa from the Mediterranean Sea to the Gulf of Guinea (1865-1867)
- Georg August Schweinfurth (1836-1925)
- Discovered the Uele River and explored the Bahr el Ghazal (1869-1871)
- With Gerhard Rohlfs, explored the Libyan Desert
