The map below, created by Reddit user vladgrinch using data from the International Institute for Strategic Studies, shows countries with larger active military personnel than the UK: 1900 vs. 2026.

The UK’s regular forces now number around 137,000 trained personnel, according to UK Ministry of Defence figures from October 2025. That places Britain below Vietnam (482,000), Egypt (438,500), and Myanmar (406,000) in raw troop numbers, among many others. Since 1945, the size of Britain’s regular armed forces has been in almost constant decline, as the empire that once needed all those soldiers wound down and defence budgets were cut repeatedly.

But troop numbers alone don’t capture what a military can actually do. Britain still ranks sixth in the world for defence spending according to SIPRI, ahead of France, Japan, and Saudi Arabia. A nuclear deterrent, two aircraft carriers, and a force designed for international deployment give the UK reach that most countries on that red map simply don’t have.

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Russia and Kazakhstan are treated as Asian countries here, since most of their territory is in Asia.

Europe comes out at 4.08 countries per million km². South America is at 0.67, roughly six times less. South American territories came out of independence roughly the size they went in and never really fragmented. In Europe, small principalities and kingdoms spent centuries competing and surviving, and a few of them are still sitting in the table below as fully sovereign nations today.

Population data by continent follows.

North America (23 countries)

Three countries hold almost all the weight here. Past Canada, the table shifts into a different category entirely — mostly small Caribbean island nations, some with populations a large university would match.

South America (12 countries)

Brazil alone covers roughly half the continent in both territory and population. Guyana and Suriname are each larger than the United Kingdom yet together have only about 1.4 million people. The Caribbean subregion of North America ended up with more sovereign states than all of South America.

Europe (43 countries)

Monaco covers 2 km². Vatican City has 882 residents and Rome surrounds it on all sides. San Marino and Liechtenstein are under 200 km² each. All four are fully recognized sovereign nations. Ukraine is Europe’s largest country by area, Russia aside, and France ranks second.

Africa (54 countries)

[INSERT AFRICA TABLE HERE]

Algeria is bigger than all of Western Europe. São Tomé and Príncipe covers about 1,000 km². Nigeria, which takes up a relatively small fraction of the continent visually, has 230 million people in it.

Asia (49 countries)

Bangladesh has 173 million people packed into an area smaller than Greece. Mongolia’s territory is four times Germany’s size, with 3.5 million people in it. India and China together approach 3 billion, more than all the other 47 countries in this region combined.

Oceania (14 countries)

Australia and Papua New Guinea together account for the vast majority of the region’s population. The remaining 12 countries are all island nations, most with populations under a million.

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Turn your attention to the Bering Strait though. Two islands there change this whole perception. Big Diomede is Russian territory. Little Diomede belongs to Alaska. The distance separating them? Just 2.4 miles (3.8 km). When fog clears and visibility improves, residents on one island look across and see the other country clearly.

The International Date Line runs right between Big Diomede and Little Diomede. This creates something truly odd. Say you’re standing on Little Diomede at 3 PM on Monday. Look west toward Big Diomede and you’re seeing Tuesday at noon over there. Same stretch of water, same gray sky, but technically tomorrow.

People started calling them Yesterday Island and Tomorrow Island because of this, because when you look at Big Diomede from Little Diomede, you’re looking into the future.

Big Diomede covers roughly 11 square miles (29 sq km). It’s been empty of permanent residents since 1948. That year, the Soviet government relocated the entire indigenous population and set up a military observation post. Today you’ll only find rotating military personnel and weather station staff.

Little Diomede is smaller at 2.8 square miles (7.3 sq km), but people actually live there. The population sits at around 77 now. In 1990, census takers counted 178 residents of the Iñupiat people, but the number has been declining.

Their ancestors have occupied this island for thousands of years, maybe longer. The village occupies a narrow beach running along the western coast. That’s literally the only level ground on the entire island. Step behind someone’s house and you’re facing slopes that climb nearly vertical to cliffs exceeding 1,600 feet (490 m).

Most of the food comes from hunting and fishing. Men hunt seals, walruses, and whales depending on the season and weather. They also fish for bullheads, tomcods, and blue cods.

In January, temperatures range from 6°F to -14°F (or -14°C to -25°C). July is the warmest month, sometimes reaching 50°F (10°C) on a good day. Each island gets about 11 inches (289 mm) of precipitation a year. Fog is constant. Wind never stops blowing.

Climate change brings practical problems to Little Diomede. Winter ice used to form thick and solid, creating a natural runway for small cargo planes. That’s becoming less reliable each year. Ice doesn’t reach proper thickness anymore, or it melts before supply deliveries finish, or some winters it barely forms at all. Helicopters handle all cargo now, which means reduced capacity and increased shipping costs.

Hunters traditionally traveled across ice to reach productive hunting grounds. When ice conditions become unpredictable, hunting becomes unpredictable too.

Buildings throughout the village face foundation issues as permafrost underneath melts. Ground that stayed frozen for thousands of years is turning soft. Structures tilt noticeably. Some sink. Others shift downslope a few inches annually. Robert Soolook, the tribal president, describes how the community responds. People adapt because they’ve always had to. Conditions change, methods change with them.

When the United States purchased Alaska from Russia in 1867, cartographers drew a new international boundary through the Bering Strait. For many decades after, indigenous families on both islands largely ignored this political line. People maintained family visits across the water. They coordinated hunting activities. Their community connections predated any European government’s territorial claims by thousands of years.

The Cold War ended that freedom. Russia reinforced its military presence on Big Diomede. American authorities began monitoring Little Diomede more closely. The narrow passage got a new name: the Ice Curtain, a frozen parallel to Europe’s Iron Curtain. Families who had crossed freely for countless generations found themselves separated by armed enforcement of the border.

The post Russia Is Only 2.4 Miles from the United States appeared first on Vivid Maps.

The Continental Shelf Boundary (CSB) defines where U.S. drilling and mining rights end offshore.

Individual states manage waters close to their shores – typically three nautical miles (5.6 km). Texas, Gulf Coast Florida, and Puerto Rico are exceptions – historical claims give them nine nautical miles (17 km). Past state waters, you hit the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). Federal land underwater. About 5 million square miles (13 million sq km) of it.

The Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) extends 200 nautical miles (370 km) from the coast and covers around 4 million square miles (10.4 million sq km. The U.S. controls commercial fishing and seabed mining within this zone. Closer to shore, the territorial sea extends 12 nautical miles (22 km), where the U.S. has complete authority.

Most places, the CSB stops at 200 nautical miles. But sometimes the shelf keeps going past that. Geologists did surveys and found places where it extends way further. They call those Extended Continental Shelf zones (ECS). The CSB goes out to 350 nautical miles (648 km) in ECS areas.

Last December, the State Department made the ECS boundaries official. They designated seven regions: the Arctic, Atlantic, Bering Sea, Pacific, areas around the Mariana Islands, and the Gulf of Mexico divided into eastern and western sections. These regions total about 381,000 square miles (987,700 sq km). The Arctic accounts for most of it – roughly 201,000 square miles (521,000 sq km).

The map displays CSB areas surrounding U.S. territories that came under American control between 1776 and 1986.

Seven of those Pacific islands (Navassa, Howland, Baker, Jarvis, Johnston, Palmyra, Kingman) were claimed under the Guano Islands Act in the same way. In the 1850s, bird droppings were valuable because synthetic fertilizer did not exist yet. Seabirds had been nesting on remote islands for thousands of years, leaving behind large guano deposits. Any American could claim an uninhabited island if it had guano.

Alaska has the largest CSB zone. When the U.S. bought it from Russia in 1867, that included massive Arctic and Bering Sea areas. Hawaii controls a big zone in the central Pacific. Tiny islands create surprisingly large CSB zones – hundreds of miles out from specks of land. Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands extend U.S. jurisdiction into the Caribbean. Guam and the Northern Marianas are located in the western Pacific, geographically closer to Manila and Tokyo than to California.

The post America’s Underwater Territory appeared first on Vivid Maps.

Technology opened things up first with submarines and icebreakers and satellites. At the same time the climate warmed and the calendar of ice shortened. Satellites have watched summer ice shrink since 1979, losing on average about 12 percent every decade. Routes that used to be blocked for months at a time are now open longer. Russia already moves cargo along the Northern Sea Route for much of the year. Some climate models still point to summers with almost no ice by 2030.

Why the scramble? Treasure and transit. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the Arctic seabed holds tens of billions of barrels of oil and over a thousand trillion cubic feet of gas. Greenland is also believed to have about 1.5 million tonnes of rare earths, which are important for batteries and electronics. Shipping through the Arctic can cut almost three weeks off the journey from Asia to Europe compared to using the Suez Canal. When time is money, those savings add up fast.

Six countries have drawn territorial claims.

Russia reopened over 50 military bases since 2014. Thirteen airfields, 10 radar stations. They’ve got eight nuclear icebreakers running. Everyone else combined? Three, maybe. Year-round Arctic access while others can’t.

Canada says the Northwest Passage is theirs. The U.S. calls it international waters. Both run military drills there now.

Greenland matters because China makes 60% of the world’s rare earths. Denmark filed their Arctic claim in December 2014. It overlaps with Russia’s claim.

The map shows 90°N falls outside everyone’s 200-mile zones. International law says that’s open ocean. Countries keep filing claims anyway, saying underwater ridges connect to their land.

Russia filed for the Lomonosov Ridge in February 2023. It’s an 1,800-kilometer (1,118-mile) underwater mountain range. They say it extends from Siberia. Canada filed in December 2022 saying it’s connected to North America. Denmark sided with Canada. The U.N. checks the geology but won’t pick sides. Countries have to negotiate directly. That takes decades.

Ice keeps melting. The 1980s had 7 million square kilometers (2.7 million sq mi) of summer ice. Now? Under 4 million square kilometers (1.54 million sq mi). Greenland dumps 280 billion tons yearly.

Norway approved Arctic drilling for 2025. Sweden’s LKAB found 1+ million tons of rare earth oxides near Kiruna in 2023. Norway found bigger deposits at Fen Carbonatite. China built polar icebreakers and calls itself “near-Arctic” despite being nowhere close.

Russia’s icebreakers run all year. Their bases cover the whole Arctic coast. The U.S. talks expansion but hasn’t built the ships. Finland and Sweden joining NATO added northern territory, but Russia already had their infrastructure up.

Who controls the Arctic? Whoever can operate ships and bases up there. Russia’s got that now. Trump wants Greenland’s rare earths and location. China’s building icebreakers anyway. Trillions in resources guarantee this keeps going.

The post Who Controls the North Pole? appeared first on Vivid Maps.

Denmark got involved in 1721 through missionary Hans Egede. What started as colonization changed over centuries. Home rule came in 1979. Greenland stayed within the Danish realm but got autonomy over domestic affairs. Denmark kept defense and foreign policy.

The differences between Denmark and Greenland are substantial. Greenland is approximately 50 times larger than Denmark, yet it contains less than 1% of Denmark’s population. Despite its vast Arctic expanse, Greenland has been largely overlooked throughout much of modern history.

The Scale of Greenland

Greenland covers 2,166,086 square kilometers or 836,330 square miles.

Countries with similar land area:

Roughly 80% of Greenland sits under an ice sheet. This isn’t seasonal snow that melts each summer. The ice averages 1,500 meters (4,921 ft) thick. In some areas it reaches 3,000 meters (9,843 ft). That immense weight has pressed underlying bedrock down over thousands of years. Complete melting would take centuries even with extreme warming. The exposed land afterward would measure around 410,000 km² (158,000 mi²). Much bedrock currently sits below sea level from compression. Post-melt Greenland would look nothing like maps show today.

Where People Actually Live

Despite this vast area, only about 57,000 people live in Greenland. That’s the lowest population density on Earth. Everyone lives along coasts. The interior ice sheet obviously can’t support towns. Roads don’t connect settlements. Travel requires boats, planes, or helicopters.

Three towns hold about half the population. Nuuk, Sisimiut, and Ilulissat are where most people live.

The small population creates unusual dynamics. Greenland governs itself domestically but can’t independently control or develop all resources. Denmark provides massive financial support and handles international relations. Every mining contract and infrastructure project involves complicated negotiations between local interests, Danish oversight, and foreign powers seeking advantage.

What’s Buried Under the Ice

Glaciers retreating across Greenland keep uncovering geology that’s been frozen for millennia:

• Rare-earth elements: 36.2 million tonnes
• Graphite: 6 million tonnes
• Nickel: 3.8 million tonnes
• Copper: 3.68 million tonnes
• Zinc: substantial deposits, quantities still uncertain

The surrounding Arctic seabed likely contains oil, natural gas, and gold.

Most people never think about rare-earths, yet our technology depends entirely on them. Neodymium, dysprosium, europium and similar elements are critical for phone screens, laptop batteries, electric car motors, wind turbines, and military guidance systems. China has cornered this market, controlling roughly 70% of mining and about 90% of processing. Beijing’s leverage here is substantial. Alternative sources would reshape global manufacturing.

Sea ice keeps shrinking. New passages open through Arctic waters. Ships taking these routes shave thousands of kilometers off trips between Asia and Europe. More importantly, they skip Suez and Panama entirely. Remember when that container ship got stuck in Suez? Global trade backed up for weeks. Arctic routes sidestep that vulnerability.

The US built Thule Air Base in northwestern Greenland in 1951. The base got renamed Pituffik Space Base. It’s positioned about 1,210 kilometers (750 miles) south of the North Pole. Operations there include satellite tracking, missile launch monitoring, and watching for threats approaching North America. During the Cold War, Soviet bombers were the main worry. Now it’s ballistic missiles and hypersonic weapons.

Russia keeps rebuilding Arctic military infrastructure systematically. Old Soviet bases get renovated. New facilities appear. China announced in 2018 that it considers itself a “near-Arctic state” despite being nowhere near the Arctic geographically. Money started flowing into Greenland mining and infrastructure projects immediately after.

Five countries get exclusive economic rights in Arctic waters under international law. Canada, Denmark (via Greenland), Norway, Russia, and the US each control resources within 200 nautical miles of their coasts. Continental shelf extensions can push those boundaries out further. Claims overlap in places. Tensions keep rising as ice melts and access improves. The gap between Greenland’s enormous territory and tiny population attracts outside interest. Massive resource wealth in a strategically important location with just 57,000 people creates opportunities for external influence.

The post Greenland’s Strategic Value appeared first on Vivid Maps.

The data comes from YouGov (Great Britain – August 2025, Australia November 2024), LucidTalk (Northern Ireland May 2023), Lord Ashcroft (Caribbean and Pacific March 2023), Pollara (Canada May 2025), and Curia (New Zealand October 2024).

England leads at 76% for the monarchy. Tuvalu in the Pacific comes in second at 73%. On the other end, Quebec shows 70% wanting a republic, way off from other Canadian provinces where the Atlantic region hits 64% for monarchy. The Bahamas registers 65% republican and Jamaica 55%. Ashcroft’s research noted that slavery and colonialism shaped how Caribbean people view the Crown. The Solomon Islands reaches 63% for a republic, but nearby Tuvalu goes the opposite direction.

In Australia, every state leans toward monarchy except the Capital Territory at 59% republican.

Barbados became a republic in 2021. Other Caribbean governments have started discussing whether to do the same. One curious finding: most people said they’d stay in the Commonwealth even as republics. The Commonwealth itself seems more popular than the monarchy.

Here’s all the numbers:

Great Britain: 74% Monarchy, 26% Republic

• England: 76% Monarchy, 24% Republic
• Wales: 62.5% Monarchy, 37.5% Republic
• Scotland: 60% Monarchy, 40% Republic

Northern Ireland: 56% Monarchy, 44% Republic

Canada: 54% Monarchy, 46% Republic

• Atlantic provinces: 64% Monarchy, 36% Republic
• Ontario: 63% Monarchy, 37% Republic
• Manitoba & Saskatchewan: 62% Monarchy, 38% Republic
• Alberta: 55% Monarchy, 45% Republic
• British Columbia: 54% Monarchy, 46% Republic
• Québec: 30% Monarchy, 70% Republic

Australia: 59% Monarchy, 41% Republic

• Queensland: 67% Monarchy, 33% Republic
• Tasmania: 64% Monarchy, 36% Republic
• Western Australia: 63% Monarchy, 37% Republic
• South Australia: 60% Monarchy, 40% Republic
• New South Wales: 58% Monarchy, 42% Republic
• Northern Territory: 55% Monarchy, 45% Republic
• Victoria: 54% Monarchy, 46% Republic
• Australian Capital Territory: 41% Monarchy, 59% Republic

New Zealand: 67% Monarchy, 33% Republic

Papua New Guinea: 53% Monarchy, 47% Republic

Solomon Islands: 37% Monarchy, 63% Republic

Tuvalu: 73% Monarchy, 27% Republic

Belize: 53% Monarchy, 47% Republic

Jamaica: 45% Monarchy, 55% Republic

Bahamas: 35% Monarchy, 65% Republic

St Kitts & Nevis: 54% Monarchy, 46% Republic

Antigua & Barbuda: 49% Monarchy, 51% Republic

St Lucia: 59% Monarchy, 41% Republic

St Vincent & the Grenadines: 65% Monarchy, 35% Republic

Grenada: 57% Monarchy, 43% Republic

Countries with deeper British roots usually favor the monarchy more. But plenty of exceptions exist – St. Vincent and the Grenadines backs the monarchy at 65% while neighboring islands don’t. These old arrangements are getting reconsidered as time goes on.

The post Mapping Monarchy Support Across 15 Commonwealth Realms appeared first on Vivid Maps.

You won’t find France on this map even though French Guiana sits in South America and Réunion is in Africa. Same goes for the UK with its Caribbean territories, or the Netherlands and Denmark with their scattered islands. Those are overseas possessions from the colonial era. This map shows countries where contiguous land crosses continental boundaries.

Russia

Russia stretches from the Baltic Sea to the Pacific Ocean. Most of the country (77%) lies in Asia. But most Russians (also 77%) live west of the Urals in Europe. Cities like Moscow and Saint Petersburg are in the European part. So are most other major population centers. Siberia is huge but doesn’t have many people.

The boundary between Europe and Asia has been debated for a long time. Some geographers prefer the Ural Mountains, others the Ural River, and some use the Caucasus range instead. The same debate applies to Kazakhstan.

Indonesia

Indonesia catches most people off guard. The country has more than 17,000 islands spread across the Indian and Pacific Oceans. Java, Bali, Sumatra, Sulawesi—all in Asia. But Papua, the Indonesian half of New Guinea, sits on the Australian continental shelf. Geographers classify it as Oceanian rather than Asian.

Papua makes up 16.7% of Indonesia. About 5 million people live there. The remaining 270 million Indonesians live on the Asian islands. Java alone, despite being much smaller than Papua, has over 150 million people. The difference comes down to terrain. Java has volcanic soil good for farming and cities built up over centuries. Papua has dense rainforest and rugged mountains.

Turkey

Just 3% of Turkey is in Europe. Around 15 million people live there, mostly in and around Istanbul. The city sits on both sides of the Bosphorus Strait—Europe on one bank, Asia on the other. Istanbul has been a major city for over 2,000 years under different names (Byzantium, then Constantinople). That history keeps drawing people there.

Egypt

Egypt is transcontinental because of the Sinai Peninsula. The Sinai sits east of the Suez Canal in Asia and takes up about 6% of Egypt’s territory. Around 1.5 million people live there. The other 103 million Egyptians live along the Nile Valley and Delta in Africa. The Nile makes Egypt livable. Without it, the country would be uninhabitable desert from the Mediterranean to Sudan. The Sinai has a few towns but it’s mostly desert.

Kazakhstan

Kazakhstan straddles the Ural River. Many geographers use that river as the Europe-Asia boundary (though as with Russia, not everyone agrees). The European section west of the river is 5.5% of Kazakhstan. About one million people live there—roughly 5% of the population.

Panama

Panama connects North and South America at their narrowest point. The Panama Canal runs through the country and marks where the two continents meet. Panama City and most other major cities are north of the canal in North America. The southern part near Colombia is less populated. Panama covers 75,417 km² (29,119 sq mi) with around 4.5 million people. The boundary between North and South America isn’t universally agreed upon. Some geographers draw it at the Panama Canal. Others use the Colombian border or place it in the Darién Gap.

Did any of these countries surprise you? Which other nations do you think should be considered transcontinental?

The post Which Countries Actually Span Two Continents? appeared first on Vivid Maps.

These get all the attention because the outcome matters. Meanwhile, nineteen states and Washington, DC have voted the same way in every presidential election since 1988. Not most elections. Every single one. Ten straight cycles without changing sides.

The Republican column has thirteen states. Alaska, Idaho, Utah, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, and South Carolina. They stretch from the Canadian border down through the interior West and into the Deep South. Mostly rural and low-population, except Texas with its huge cities.

The Democratic side has seven states plus DC. Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota, New York, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and the District. More scattered geographically but just as reliable.

The Republican belt runs continuously through America’s middle. The Democratic states jump around the map but stay predictable. Geography matters here, though it doesn’t explain everything about why these particular places stay loyal while neighbors switch around.

Take Minnesota. Right in the heartland, bordered by states that swing. But it hasn’t gone Republican since 1972. Longest Democratic streak in the country. Wisconsin next door? Competitive. Iowa? Competitive. Minnesota? Blue every time.

Why start at 1988? That election marked a shift in American politics. Current alignments began taking shape then. Since that year, these twenty states held their ground through the internet, 9/11, the 2008 crash, social media, everything. Huge upheavals, same voting patterns.

For campaigns, this creates a math problem. Republicans bank on 107 electoral votes before they start. Democrats count on 112. Those numbers are guaranteed. The fight happens everywhere else.

Living in one of these states means your presidential vote happens in a predetermined environment. No campaign visits. No ads. The result is baked in. The electoral college amplifies this because all the action happens in maybe seven competitive states while everyone else watches.

Will this change? Probably not soon. These states proved their reliability across four decades. They’re stable in ways that make them invisible during campaigns, but they’re the foundation everything else sits on.

The post The Geography of Predictability: 20 States That Never Switch Sides appeared first on Vivid Maps.

Blues cover Democratic majorities, reds Republican, getting darker with more wins for that side. White means a straight split. The West Coast jumps out in blue, with places like California and Washington showing heavy Democratic support. Down South and across the Plains, red takes over, like in Texas and Alabama where Republicans have held strong.

A few whites pop up for balance, such as Arizona or Louisiana, keeping things close.

The table here lists the wins from the map’s info.

Twelve states picked Republicans all six times, spread through the South and Mountain areas like Texas or Utah. Just three went all Democratic—Delaware, Oregon, Washington. Ties show up in four places, hinting at competitive spots.

Places like Kansas or Kentucky have more Democratic governors than their red rep might suggest, maybe from candidates hitting local notes. Pennsylvania leans Democratic here, unlike its toss-up presidential status.

New Hampshire and Vermont do governors every two years, covering less time than the four-year states. The map gets you wondering about population changes or big local topics driving these choices.

If election maps interest you, have a look at my 2024 U.S. presidential election map.

The post U.S. States by Party They Voted for in Their Last Six Gubernatorial Elections appeared first on Vivid Maps.