1642 Abel Janszoon Tasman reaches New Zealand.
1642 Abel Tasman becomes first European to land in New Zealand.
1827 Shrigley Abduction: Ellen Turner is abducted by Edward Gibbon Wakefield, a future politician in colonial New Zealand.
1840 Signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, establishing New Zealand as a British colony.
1845 The Flagstaff War: Unhappy with translational differences regarding the Treaty of Waitangi, chiefs Hone Heke, Kawiti and Māori tribe members chop down the British flagpole for a fourth time and drive settlers out of Kororareka, New Zealand.
1848 The ship ''John Wickliffe'' arrives at Port Chalmers carrying the first Scottish settlers for Dunedin, New Zealand. Otago province is founded.
1856 Christchurch, New Zealand is chartered as a city.
1860 The First Taranaki War begins in Taranaki, New Zealand, a major phase of the New Zealand land wars.
1860 The Second Maori War begins in New Zealand.
1861 The First Taranaki War ends in New Zealand.
1863 ''HMS Orpheus'' sinks off the coast of Auckland, New Zealand, killing 189.
1863 The Maori Wars resumes as British forces in New Zealand led by General Duncan Cameron begin their Invasion of the Waikato.
1868 Time zone: New Zealand officially adopts a standard time to be observed nationally
1870 The first game of rugby in New Zealand is played in Nelson between Nelson College and the Nelson Rugby Football Club.
1876 New Zealand's provincial government system is dissolved.
1886 Mount Tarawera in New Zealand erupts, killing 153 people and destroying the famous Pink and White Terraces.
1893 Women's suffrage: in New Zealand, the Electoral Act of 1893 is consented to by the governor giving all women in New Zealand the right to vote.
1893 Women's suffrage: in New Zealand, the Electoral Act of 1893 is consented to by the governor giving all women in New Zealand the right to vote.
1901 New Zealand annexes the Cook Islands.
1907 New Zealand and Newfoundland each become dominions within the British Empire.
1914 World War I: Australian and New Zealand troops arrive in Cairo, Egypt.
1917 World War I: The First Battle of Passchendaele takes place resulting in the largest single day loss of life in New Zealand history.
1931 Guy Menzies flies the first solo non-stop trans-Tasman flight (from Australia to New Zealand) in 11 hours and 45 minutes, crash-landing on New Zealand's west coast.
1931 The Hawke's Bay earthquake, New Zealand's worst natural disaster, kills 258.
1939 World War II: France, the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Australia declare war on Germany after the invasion of Poland, forming the Allies.
1944 Diplomatic relations between New Zealand and the Soviet Union are established.
1947 The Ballantyne's Department Store fire in Christchurch, New Zealand, kills 41 (New Zealand's worst ever fire).
1947 New Zealand ratifies the Statute of Westminster and thus becomes independent of legislative control by the United Kingdom.
1951 The United States, Australia and New Zealand sign a mutual defense pact, called the ANZUS Treaty.
1953 Tangiwai disaster: A railway bridge is destroyed by a lahar at Tangiwai, in the Central North Island of New Zealand, sending a fully loaded passenger train into the Whangaehu River, and killing 153 people.
1954 New Zealand's Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents reports just ten days after concluding hearings.
1959 The Auckland Harbour Bridge, crossing the Waitemata Harbour in Auckland, New Zealand, is officially opened by Governor-General Lord Cobham.
1960 New Zealand's first official television broadcast commences at 7.30pm from Auckland.
1962 Western Samoa achieves independence from New Zealand; its name is changed to the Independent State of Western Samoa.
1965 The Constitution of Cook Islands comes into force, giving the Cook Islands self-governing status within New Zealand.
1968 Shipwreck of the New Zealand inter-island ferry TEV ''Wahine'' outside Wellington harbour.
1969 The United Kingdom introduces the British fifty-pence coin, which replaced, over the following years, the British ten-shilling note, in anticipation of the decimalization of the British currency in 1971, and the abolition of the shilling as a unit of currency anywhere in the world. (Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, etc., had already abolished the shilling in favor of a decimal currency with exactly 100 pence per pound sterling or dollar, whichever was applicable.}
1971 Vietnam War: Australia and New Zealand decide to withdraw their troops from Vietnam.
1976 The opening of the Summer Olympics in Montreal is marred by 25 African teams boycotting the New Zealand team.
1977 Minister of Internal Affairs Allan Highet announces that 'the national anthems of New Zealand shall be the traditional anthem "God Save the Queen" and the poem "God Defend New Zealand", written by Thomas Bracken, as set to music by John Joseph Woods, both being of equal status as national anthems appropriate to the occasion.
1986 The Soviet liner {{MS|Mikhail Lermontov||6}} runs aground in the Marlborough Sounds, New Zealand.
1987 New Zealand's Labour government establishes a national nuclear-free zone under the New Zealand Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament, and Arms Control Act 1987
1989 United Airlines Flight 811, bound for New Zealand from Honolulu, Hawaii, rips open during flight, sucking 9 passengers out of the business-class section.
1990 In Aramoana, New Zealand, David Gray shoots dead 13 people, in what becomes known as the Aramoana Massacre.
1991 New Zealand's Resource Management Act 1991 comes into force.
1993 An earthquake measuring 7.0 on the Richter Scale hits the South Island of New Zealand.
1997 The tallest free-standing structure in the Southern Hemisphere, Sky Tower in downtown Auckland, New Zealand, opens after two-and-a-half years of construction.
1999 The left-wing Labour Party takes control of the New Zealand government with leader Helen Clark becoming the first elected female Prime Minister in New Zealand's history.
2007 Seventeen activists in New Zealand are arrested in the country's first post 9/11 anti-terrorism raids.