The real size of the world

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One of the most common maps of the world is in fact, one of the most misleading. The size of countries & continents has been either exaggerated or downplayed. But why is this and what is the real size of the world?

The Earth is a 3D sphere making it mathematically impossible to have an accurate model when laid flat. The size and shapes of countries become distorted once you do.

The most recognized map, the Mercator projection, stretches countries and continents the further you move away from the equator.

The map below shows how does the Mercator projection distort the world? Light blue is a map as we know it, and dark blue is each country’s actual size.

Another way to represent the actual sizes of countries is to represent them as rectangles. The map below world countries shown as correctly sized rectangles (50 largest nations are labeled in size order).