The familiar rectangular world map (the Mercator projection) is great for navigation—but it badly distorts size. Areas stretch more as you move toward the poles, so high‑latitude places look enormous while equatorial regions look smaller than reality.
What’s going on?
Mercator preserves angles and shapes locally (good for compass bearings), not areas. That means anything far from the equator is scaled up. Modern web maps often use "Web Mercator," which keeps the same size distortion for convenience with map tiles.
Quick size comparisons (real area)
| Looks on Mercator | Reality (approx. km²) |
|---|---|
| Greenland ≈ Africa (similar size?) | Africa ~30.4M vs Greenland ~2.2M → Africa is ~14× larger |
| Europe looks as big as South America | South America ~17.8M vs Europe ~10.2M |
| Alaska looks bigger than Mexico | Mexico ~1.97M vs Alaska ~1.72M (Mexico is larger) |
| Antarctica looks impossibly huge | Antarctica ~14.0M—large, but Mercator inflates it even more |
Better ways to see size
- Equal‑area maps (e.g., Gall–Peters, Mollweide, Eckert IV) keep area honest, so comparisons are fair.
- Globes avoid projection distortion entirely.
- Interactive tools that let you drag outlines ("The True Size Of…") are great for intuition.
Takeaway
Use Mercator for routes and bearings; use equal‑area projections when comparing how big places really are. Want to test your geography instincts? Try a few continent quizzes on CapQuiz and see what sticks!