How many Greenlands fit in South America?
8.1 Greenlands fit in South America.
- Really
- 8.1
- As Mercator draws it
- 0.6
Mercator makes it look like only 0.6, fewer than the 8.1 that really fit. This time the container is the one nearer the equator, and so the one inflated less.
Drawn to scale
The two places at one scale, side by side. South America is painted the same size in both panels, so the only thing that changes is Greenland - and how much it changes on the Mercator side is exactly how far that map moves the count.
- Equal Earth8.1 Greenlands
- Mercator0.6 Greenlands
The two are drawn beside each other, not packed one inside the other. What the picture gets exactly right is the ratio of the areas; whether irregular shapes would actually tile without gaps is a different question, and this figure does not answer it.
Look at the Mercator panel: Greenland is painted 1.74 times the size of the whole of South America, which it is a fraction of in truth. The ruler comes out larger than the thing it is measuring.
Why the two differ
Mercator draws Greenland 16.5 times its true area and South America 1.17 times. The count is the ratio of the two, so what moves it is not the inflation itself but the ratio between the two inflations. Whichever sits closer to a pole is blown up more.
- Ruler
- Greenland 2,190,038 km²
- Container
- South America 17,815,855 km²
What each projection says
Every row is the ratio of the areas that projection paints for itself, not a figure converted from another projection's baseline. The two equal-area members return the true count, which is their definition rather than a coincidence.
| Projection | Count as drawn |
|---|---|
| Equirectangular | 2.3 |
| Mercator | 0.6 |
| Natural Earth | 4.0 |
| Equal Earth | 8.1 true |
| Gall-Peters | 8.1 true |
On an equal-area projection
Under Equal Earth or Gall-Peters the two figures are identical - for every pair on this site. An equal-area projection draws in proportion to true area, so the count you can see is the count there is. That is a definition, not a coincidence.
Next door
Greenland somewhere else
- How many Greenlands fit in Asia?
- How many Greenlands fit in Africa?
- How many Greenlands fit in North America?
- How many Greenlands fit in Russia?
- How many Greenlands fit in Canada?
- How many Greenlands fit in the United States?
- How many Greenlands fit in China?
- How many Greenlands fit in Brazil?
- How many Greenlands fit in Oceania?
- How many Greenlands fit in Australia?
- How many Greenlands fit in Europe?