Earth
The True Size of Africa: How Many Countries Fit Inside?
Flat world maps shrink Africa compared with countries far from the equator. This Short drops several large countries, shown at their real size, onto Africa to reveal how much room it has. It explains that the common Mercator map inflates high-latitude areas while Africa, sitting on the equator, barely gets enlarged.
The numbers
- Africa covers about 30.4 million km², enough to hold the US three times.
- The US, China, India, Mexico, the EU and Japan together fill about 95% of Africa.
- The Sahara alone is about 9.2 million km², close to the size of the US.
- Africa stretches roughly 8,100 km from north to south.
- On a Mercator map, land at 60° latitude looks about 4 times its true area.
Sources cited in the video: United Nations Statistics Division · Snyder, Map Projections: A Working Manual (USGS) · NASA Blue Marble · Natural Earth
