The true size of countries
Most world maps make countries near the poles look far too big. Drag a country toward the equator and it shrinks to its true size. Drag it north and it grows.
Drag a country, see its true size
Loading the map...
Drag the coloured shape anywhere on the map. It keeps its real size on the globe, so the map redraws it bigger near the poles and smaller near the equator.
Surprising size comparisons
On a normal world map the first country in each row looks bigger. It is not. Press the button to put one on top of the other.
- Looks bigger Greenland 2,166,086 km² Is actually bigger DR Congo 2,344,860 km² Real difference 1.08× larger
Greenland sits so far north that most maps draw it bigger than all of Central Africa.
- Looks bigger Iceland 103,000 km² Is actually bigger Cuba 109,880 km² Real difference 1.07× larger
Iceland looks several times bigger than Cuba. Cuba is slightly larger.
- Looks bigger United Kingdom 242,500 km² Is actually bigger Madagascar 587,000 km² Real difference 2.42× larger
Madagascar is more than twice the size of the UK.
- Looks bigger Mongolia 1,564,110 km² Is actually bigger Sudan 1,886,070 km² Real difference 1.21× larger
Mongolia looks enormous. Sudan is larger.
- Looks bigger Germany 357,110 km² Is actually bigger Japan 377,980 km² Real difference 1.06× larger
Japan is often thought of as small. It is larger than Germany.
- Looks bigger Canada 9,984,670 km² Is actually bigger Russia 17,098,240 km² Real difference 1.71× larger
Both look huge, but Russia is much bigger than Canada.
- Looks bigger India 3,287,260 km² Is actually bigger Russia 17,098,240 km² Real difference 5.20× larger
Russia looks more than ten times bigger than India. The real difference is about five times.
Popular size comparisons
- Greenland vs DR Congo
- Greenland vs Australia
- Greenland vs United States
- Greenland vs Brazil
- Greenland vs India
- Greenland vs Mexico
- Greenland vs Saudi Arabia
- Greenland vs Algeria
- Russia vs Canada
- Russia vs United States
- Russia vs China
- Russia vs Brazil
- Russia vs Australia
- Russia vs India
- Canada vs United States
- Canada vs China
- United States vs China
- United States vs Brazil
- United States vs Australia
- Australia vs Brazil
- India vs China
- India vs United States
- India vs Australia
- United Kingdom vs Japan
- United Kingdom vs Germany
- United Kingdom vs New Zealand
- United Kingdom vs Madagascar
- United Kingdom vs France
- France vs Spain
- Germany vs Japan
- Germany vs France
- Iceland vs Cuba
- Iceland vs Ireland
- Norway vs Japan
- Sweden vs Germany
- Finland vs Italy
- Mongolia vs Sudan
- Kazakhstan vs India
- Argentina vs India
- Mexico vs Indonesia
- Ukraine vs France
- Turkey vs France
- Egypt vs France
- Nigeria vs France
- Italy vs United Kingdom
- Poland vs Germany
- Philippines vs Italy
- New Zealand vs Japan
- South Africa vs France
- Iran vs Mexico
- Kenya vs France
- Thailand vs France
- Vietnam vs Italy
Why countries look the wrong size
Almost every world map you see online uses the Mercator projection, or Web Mercator, the version behind Google Maps and OpenStreetMap. Mercator keeps the shape of small areas correct, but it stretches everything away from the equator, and that stretching gets stronger the closer you get to the poles.
That is why Greenland, Canada, Russia and Scandinavia look huge, and why Africa, South America and Southeast Asia look smaller than they really are. The countries are not wrong. The map is.
How much Mercator stretches area
| Latitude | For example | Drawn this many times too big |
|---|---|---|
| 0° | Ecuador, Kenya, Singapore | ×1.0 |
| 30° | Cairo, New Orleans | ×1.3 |
| 45° | Bordeaux, Minneapolis | ×2.0 |
| 60° | Oslo, Helsinki, southern Alaska | ×4.0 |
| 70° | Northern Norway, central Greenland | ×8.5 |
| 80° | Svalbard, northern Greenland | ×33 |
The stretch is 1 divided by the cosine of the latitude, squared. At 60° north a country is drawn four times larger than the same country would be at the equator.
How this map keeps sizes true
When you drag a country, it is not slid across the flat map. It is moved across the globe, keeping its real size and shape there, and then drawn with the same Mercator projection as the rest of the map. That is why a shape bends and grows as you pull it north: you are seeing exactly how the map distorts it at its new latitude. Areas shown on the map are measured from the outlines drawn, which leave out far-off islands such as Hawaii, so they can differ slightly from official figures.
How big is Africa really?
Africa covers about 30 million km², roughly a fifth of all the land on Earth. The United States, China, India, Japan and every country in Europe except Russia would fit inside it together, and there would still be room left over.
On a Mercator map Africa looks about the same size as Greenland or Russia. In reality it is about 14 times larger than Greenland and almost twice the size of Russia. Because Africa straddles the equator, it is one of the few places that Mercator draws at close to its true size. Everything around it is what gets inflated.
How big is Greenland really?
Greenland covers about 2.2 million km². That makes it the largest island in the world, but it is only about the size of Saudi Arabia, and smaller than Algeria, Kazakhstan or Argentina.
On most world maps it looks as big as all of Africa. At Greenland's latitude, around 72° north, the Mercator projection inflates area roughly ten times, and its northern tip even more. Drag it to the equator on the map above and it shrinks to the size of a large African country.
Is Russia as big as it looks?
Russia really is the largest country in the world, at about 17.1 million km². But most of it lies far to the north, where Mercator inflates it four to five times, so on a normal map it looks larger than Africa. It is actually a little more than half the size of Africa.
Canada and Russia exaggerate each other in the same way. Both look enormous, both lie mostly above 50° north, and Russia is about 1.7 times the size of Canada.
Where the idea of "true size" comes from
People have argued about the size of countries on maps for more than 450 years. The drag-and-compare map is only the latest answer to a very old problem.
- 1569
Mercator draws his world map
The Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator publishes a world map built for sailors: a straight line on it is a constant compass course. To make that work he stretches the map more and more towards the poles, and the size problem is born.
- 1855
The first equal-area alternative
The Scottish clergyman James Gall describes a projection that keeps every country at its correct relative size. Almost nobody pays attention.
- 1973
The Peters map controversy
The German historian Arno Peters presents an almost identical map at a press conference in Bonn and argues that Mercator makes Europe and North America look more important than Africa and South America. The map, now called Gall-Peters, becomes famous and bitterly debated.
- 1989
Geographers take a stand
Several North American geography organisations issue a joint resolution asking publishers and the media to stop using rectangular world maps such as Mercator for general purposes.
- 2005
Mercator moves online
Google Maps launches on Web Mercator, a close variant of Mercator that works perfectly for street maps. Almost every online map follows, so a generation grows up with Greenland the size of Africa on their screens.
- 2010
The True Size of Africa
The designer Kai Krause publishes a graphic that fits the United States, China, India, Japan and most of Europe inside the outline of Africa. It spreads worldwide and gives the whole idea its name.
- 2017
Schools change their maps
Boston Public Schools in the United States replace Mercator maps in classrooms with Gall-Peters maps, reopening the debate about which world map children should learn from.
- 2018
Equal Earth
Cartographers Bojan Šavrič, Tom Patterson and Bernhard Jenny publish Equal Earth, an equal-area projection that keeps sizes true while looking far more familiar than Gall-Peters.
Interactive maps like this one take a different route. Instead of asking you to trust a new projection, they keep the familiar map and let you move a country yourself, so you can see the distortion happen.
Using the true size map in class
The map needs no login and works on phones, tablets and interactive whiteboards. A few activities that work well:
- Ask students to guess which is bigger, Greenland or the Democratic Republic of the Congo, then drag one onto the other.
- Move your own country to the equator and to the far north, and discuss why its size changes on the map but not on the globe.
- Give each group a country from the comparison list and have them explain the difference using latitude.
- Compare the map with a globe or an equal-area world map, then discuss which one is "right" and for what purpose.
Practice with Games
Ready to test what you learned? Jump into a game and put it into practice.
Questions about the true size of countries
Why do countries look bigger on maps than they really are?
Because most world maps use the Mercator projection, which stretches areas more and more the further they are from the equator. At 60° latitude everything is drawn four times too big, and at 70° more than eight times. Countries near the equator are drawn about right, so by comparison they look too small.
Is Greenland bigger than Africa?
No. Africa is about 14 times larger than Greenland. Greenland is not even as big as the Democratic Republic of the Congo, one of Africa's 54 countries. It only looks similar in size because it lies so far north.
What is the biggest country in the world?
Russia, at about 17.1 million km². That is roughly twice the size of Brazil and about 11% of all the land on Earth. It is still much smaller than it looks on a Mercator map, because most of Russia lies far to the north.
Is Russia bigger than Africa?
No. Russia is about 17.1 million km² and Africa about 30 million km², so Africa is almost twice as big. Russia only looks larger on most maps because it lies so far north, where the Mercator projection inflates area four to five times.
Who made the first true size map?
The idea of an equal-area world map goes back to James Gall in 1855 and was made famous by Arno Peters in 1973. The phrase "true size" took off in 2010 with Kai Krause's graphic The True Size of Africa, which fitted the United States, China, India, Japan and most of Europe inside Africa. Drag-and-compare maps like this one grew out of that idea.
Which map shows the true size of countries?
An equal-area projection, such as Gall-Peters, Mollweide or Equal Earth, shows every country at its correct size relative to the others. The price is that shapes get stretched or squashed. A globe is the only map that gets both size and shape right.
Why do Google Maps and other online maps still use Mercator?
Because at street level it keeps shapes and angles correct, so a square building stays square at any zoom. It also fits neatly into square map tiles. The size distortion only becomes a problem when you zoom out to look at the whole world.