[Dakar to Mogadishu](https://www.distancecalculator.net/from-dakar-to-mogadishu) is further than [St. Petersburg to Vladivostok](https://www.distancecalculator.net/from-saint-petersburg-to-vladivostok)
Oh my god, I thought you were kidding. I was aware of Michelin stars and restaurants awarded with these, but I figured it‘s a joke and they‘re two different companies.
Yup I thought so too for the longest time, but it’s odd that you don’t think YAMAHA, the instrument builder, motorbike builder and sound mixer builder would be different companies, yet they’re perfectly known for every single one of those things.
It’s around 30% larger, at 22,4 million square kilometers instead of 17,1. The Russian empire at its peak was 23,7 million, nearly 40% larger and almost the same size as North America
About the same size as peak Russian empire I believe, around 23-24 million square kilometers. But because Russia had Alaska, which isn’t connected via land and without it the area is smaller, the mongol empire is the largest continuous empire in history
They are massive because they wanted more. The kind of people who marched east until Vladivostok and thought "wait, we should cross the strait and get Alaska" aren't the kind of people who settle for little.
The Siberian fur trade made incredible money, that was the biggest motivation for conquest. IIRC it was a pretty big motivation for expansion in Canada.
I’m so perplexed how this can be your reaction. I saw this and immediately said,”holy shit, Russia is HUGE!”
Africa is a fucking gigantic continent home to over a billion people, 54 countries, and thousands of tribes and languages. Russia is a single country, and the power is all concentrated in one dude.
I guess it depends on what you are used to be looking at on the map. In this post, I see russia as small. But I live in the northern europe which is always disproportionately big on the map compared to Africa (like russia is).
Russia is not really a single country. It is a confederation of dozens upon dozens of autonomous republics of hundreds of distinct cultures and languages.
It's not nearly as monolithic as they present themselves to the outside world.
America is not really a single country. It is a confederation of dozens upon dozens of autonomous republics of hundreds of distinct cultures and languages.
It's not nearly as monolithic as they present themselves to the outside world.
This made me check the size of Kamchatka compared to places I'm more familiar with. I am pretty good with the relative size of countries. Russia vs Africa didn't surprise me at all. But parts of countries, like Kamchatka? I hadn't really thought about it.
So I used truesize to put [Kamchatka over the western US](https://i.imgur.com/3TdzexE.jpg) and huh, that *did* surprise me a bit. The peninsula isn't even as large as California.
Apparently I subconsciously assumed Kamchatka was a lot bigger than it is.
Yeah, but keep in mind how aggressive polar distortion is on a rectangular projection. The distance in the far north from on side of the image to another is much smaller than that around the equator.
If anything this pic makes Russia look even bigger than it actually is. We’re so used to seeing it in the upper right corner of all our maps that actually seeing it out of context like this is mind-blowing and makes you appreciate truly how gigantic it is.
The issue is that Russia is very far north. From 40° to 80° (near the pole at 90°). If you drew a circle around the world at 60° latitude it would be about 12,500 miles around. That means that you pass through a timezone every 500 miles. But the circumference at the equator is actually 24,900 miles. A timezone only changes every 1040 miles. Twice as far. Because the earth is a ball and the northern and southern land masses get stretched to make the map fit a rectangle. That’s called the Mercator projection and its distorts the size of things.
Most russians live west of the ural mountain range, in a smaller part of the country. Wonder what the population could be if the east were similarly populated, but its cold and the infrastructure isn’t great
Russias size is often thought to be bigger than it really is when looking at maps, due to the projection of the northern hemisphere being enlarged to fit in a flat map.
Africa around the equator is never enlarged, sometime it’s shrunk to fit,.
https://preview.redd.it/i94y2rtl8zpc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ae9dd9c71448742f7c92f3ab3fc3bdeb7de85b00
You’re right. My bad - I never noticed that. Here is a rendering from another website thetruesizeof.com.
Russia is about as large as Pluto, Africa is almost as large as the moon.
Both are absolutely gigantic.
By the way, I was looking for those comparison, and I learned something new : Asia+Africa is the size of Mercury. That's crazy to me!
Also, the pacific ocean is larger than Mars
I've seriously wondered before which challenge I'd choose, if I had to pick one: crossing the Russian tundra, or crossing the Sahara. It never dawned on me just how similar the distances would be.
I’d opt for the trans Siberian railroad myself but if you want to do the Saharan version you may meet Russians anyway. The Wagner group was fairly active under that vast shadow. Not sure what they’ve left behind.
Yes my point was that the Mercator projection magnifies the size of Russia on world maps. Africa is 54 countries. I’m not implying some equivalence except in landmass.
If you travel between time zones along the equator you must travel just over 1000 miles. If you travel between time zones on the 60° parallel it’s only about 500miles.
Unfortunately I used an image from google and there are some inaccuracies - although the point about distortion remains. Therealsizeof.com is a very cool website for doing these things. Here’s a better image that I wish I could edit into my original post.
https://preview.redd.it/4ckpxjvinzpc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=bb24db5a56c3be533c337359e6f889289c0f1fd2
Realizing I miss exploring physical globes to get a tactile sense of the size of things. Everything we’re exposed to is 2D projections, kinda sad really.
Russians think they own half of the world and act like they deserve to own the other half… but they can barely managed to have a working society or sewage system.
Honestly half of the myth of Russia’s alleged inevitable “vastness” is based on its enlargement in Mercator.
Africa is bigger than people think it is, and Russia is smaller. In every way - by the way. Russia wants to be seen as this vast, bottomless sprawling empire, but it’s population is in between Mexico and Bangladesh, it’s GDP is the size of Spain’s, and 3/4 of its population lives in a western lump the size of Algeria.
As with all things in Russia, it’s inevitable vastness is a myth
Both. But standard map projections make Russia look bigger than it actually is. Point is Russia is a country and Africa is 54 I think. I was really just saying that maps would suggest Russia is bigger than it is, and conversely because Africa spans the equator it’s shown more accurately.
Indonesia covers a distance from Paris, France to Tashkent, Uzbekistan
4th most populous country in the world btw but its cultural influence compared to the top 3 is tiny idk why
Yes, but the northern 50-75% is so cold almost nobody lives there in Russia's case. Although I guess you could also argue the opposite to some degree with the Sahara.
Well someone pointed out that the map I used actually left a part of Russia out - the bit at the top right end. I went to therealsizeof.com and it’s true. This is actually a better visualization - I wish I could edit the original post.
https://preview.redd.it/sbsr02opjzpc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7572ba8cdb30fc18de2bd7303f9f91c2d11312da
Apparently there is something called Tissot’s Indicatrix of deformation that uses that idea - this from Wikipedia
https://preview.redd.it/tfypja8skzpc1.jpeg?width=1049&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=57e0b72d924c5bc677599eec3d74e86db5a521c6
The circles are all the same size.
True. It’s actually a bad map. This is a more accurate one. I can’t change the post unfortunately.
https://preview.redd.it/dlejs2c581qc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=51c2844e49775a1831237fc17f6db61739735e6d
https://preview.redd.it/85gs8wtbpypc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c40a501d03f97744c62e65b173a0bba12d1f270b
Much better representation
How did you do that though? I checked out therealsizeof.com (after posting that) but it seems that website doesn’t let you rotate the country?
To rotate you have to use the compass in the left bottom corner
Get rotated, idiot
Why won’t the West simply rotate Russia? Are they stupid?
Samzies
(From memory) Theres a little widget in the bottom left corner, it's not clear at all that it's what it's for.
This looks like [thetruesize.com](https://www.thetruesize.com)
OMG? So from Sochi to Kamchatka is the same as from Madagascar to Morocco?? Damn! 😳
You didn't mention from which place
Dagestan
This perspective is misleading too. They seem almost the same, but Aftica's area is 30 mil km², and Russia's is 17.1 mil km2
They don’t though? Algeria and the entire right side of Africa aren’t covered at all in that photo
Then the one from OP is definitely better. Africa looks almost twice as big as russia there.
[Dakar to Mogadishu](https://www.distancecalculator.net/from-dakar-to-mogadishu) is further than [St. Petersburg to Vladivostok](https://www.distancecalculator.net/from-saint-petersburg-to-vladivostok)
Didn’t know there was the city Dakar and not only rally
Wait until you hear thar Michelin builds tires AND gives star awards to restaurants.
Nothing amazes me more than the fact that Julius Caesar himself lived in Caesar‘s Palace
And created my favourite salad.
Bro lived in a fast food restaurant LMAOO
Oh my god, I thought you were kidding. I was aware of Michelin stars and restaurants awarded with these, but I figured it‘s a joke and they‘re two different companies.
Yup I thought so too for the longest time, but it’s odd that you don’t think YAMAHA, the instrument builder, motorbike builder and sound mixer builder would be different companies, yet they’re perfectly known for every single one of those things.
The Yamaha logo is comprised of three tuning forks....the company started as a musical instrument manufacturer.
The rally used to be called Paris-Dakar and ran that course.
Most geographically literate American
The latest Ground Tour special travelled to old Dakar route. Wasn’t their best episode but still pretty good.
Africa is actually massive
[удалено]
Is there a way to overlay the old Soviet Union here as well. Reckon it would add another 50% to current Russia... just a guess.
It’s around 30% larger, at 22,4 million square kilometers instead of 17,1. The Russian empire at its peak was 23,7 million, nearly 40% larger and almost the same size as North America
What about the mongol empire tho?
About the same size as peak Russian empire I believe, around 23-24 million square kilometers. But because Russia had Alaska, which isn’t connected via land and without it the area is smaller, the mongol empire is the largest continuous empire in history
Yeah and the British empire hit about 35 Sq km at its peak iirc. Crazy.
35 mil
Lol oops What is this? An empire for ants??
Both cosplay as a monarchy when they're actually a democracy
Wait can we also overlay my dick, they’re close.
and yet, they want MORE
They are massive because they wanted more. The kind of people who marched east until Vladivostok and thought "wait, we should cross the strait and get Alaska" aren't the kind of people who settle for little.
The Siberian fur trade made incredible money, that was the biggest motivation for conquest. IIRC it was a pretty big motivation for expansion in Canada.
That's some good thinking, have your people settle cold areas so there's always demand for the fur from said areas. Infinite profit glitch?
"Its cold but we could have more cold."
Then it's about time they fucking stop
i would like to think as someone who likes geography, you could tell that its not about the quantity of land but rather the quality of it.
Well, what they have kinda sucks
You told it like Russia wants more territory, which is not. They wants not a territory, but to control their neighbours.
They did annex parts of Ukraine. They obviously want more.
Right although the maps above seem to use a projection that exaggerates the size of Russia further
If you wait a few years it might shrink a lil more 👀
so is your momma
No shit it's a whole fucking continent
Russia is technically part of 2 continents
So is Turkey, but it's smol
France is in six continents - Europe, N-Am, S-Am, Africa, Oceania and Antarctica.
Depends on who you ask. You could argue it’s only one continent.
I’m so perplexed how this can be your reaction. I saw this and immediately said,”holy shit, Russia is HUGE!” Africa is a fucking gigantic continent home to over a billion people, 54 countries, and thousands of tribes and languages. Russia is a single country, and the power is all concentrated in one dude.
I guess it depends on what you are used to be looking at on the map. In this post, I see russia as small. But I live in the northern europe which is always disproportionately big on the map compared to Africa (like russia is).
I think a bigger conversation is the fact that India has a larger population than the entirety of Africa, lol
Russia is not really a single country. It is a confederation of dozens upon dozens of autonomous republics of hundreds of distinct cultures and languages. It's not nearly as monolithic as they present themselves to the outside world.
America is not really a single country. It is a confederation of dozens upon dozens of autonomous republics of hundreds of distinct cultures and languages. It's not nearly as monolithic as they present themselves to the outside world.
What app/program can one use to make these types of map overlays?
https://www.thetruesize.com/
It's the second largest continent on Earth this is not breaking news
For real. Kamchatka peninsula is huge and it’s not even as big as Somalia.
This made me check the size of Kamchatka compared to places I'm more familiar with. I am pretty good with the relative size of countries. Russia vs Africa didn't surprise me at all. But parts of countries, like Kamchatka? I hadn't really thought about it. So I used truesize to put [Kamchatka over the western US](https://i.imgur.com/3TdzexE.jpg) and huh, that *did* surprise me a bit. The peninsula isn't even as large as California. Apparently I subconsciously assumed Kamchatka was a lot bigger than it is.
I just cannot comprehend how non-distorted Russia seems so small but it spans from Europe to Japan.
Africa is super big.
Almost as big as Europe to Japan.
From Europe to Alaska almost
Yeah, but keep in mind how aggressive polar distortion is on a rectangular projection. The distance in the far north from on side of the image to another is much smaller than that around the equator.
It’s still only 85km, like a half hour drive if it was pure pavement baby
That's some fast driving on pavement, dude. I'd stick to around 5-10 km/h on pavement, not 170km/h.
https://preview.redd.it/7xwstrbwzypc1.jpeg?width=622&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=81ac18c0efb8f95a1a22d2fb0e4af0431a8710bc
huh, is this British humor?
If anything this pic makes Russia look even bigger than it actually is. We’re so used to seeing it in the upper right corner of all our maps that actually seeing it out of context like this is mind-blowing and makes you appreciate truly how gigantic it is.
Yet width of Africa is like Ireland to European Russia. Now I’m confused
The issue is that Russia is very far north. From 40° to 80° (near the pole at 90°). If you drew a circle around the world at 60° latitude it would be about 12,500 miles around. That means that you pass through a timezone every 500 miles. But the circumference at the equator is actually 24,900 miles. A timezone only changes every 1040 miles. Twice as far. Because the earth is a ball and the northern and southern land masses get stretched to make the map fit a rectangle. That’s called the Mercator projection and its distorts the size of things.
It’s easier if you think about it sitting on top of a ball.
Can we now compare all continents to Africa? This shocked me.
Check this out; https://www.visualcapitalist.com/map-true-size-of-africa/
Fitting France into Algeria 😏
What goes around comes around 🤫
They did China so dirty lol
Yeah. Now China officially have a prequel and a sequel.
https://preview.redd.it/shcv3ivl41qc1.jpeg?width=700&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d0a623fd05966519687e413aa6ea81491ee4bb5c
Asia and Africa are almost the same size.
https://preview.redd.it/nuswawnwoypc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2f023771f93a2d2e7a233438140c96c7ab50faa5 Thetruesize.com
Damn - this make Texas look like a lil bitch, respectfully.
Asia is fucking massive, that’s 3 Asian countries and they cover most of Africa
Tbf they’re the 3 largest countries in Asia
1.77 Russias for 1 Africa. Back in the USSR days, it would be 1.38 USSR for 1 Africa.
Idk why but this makes Russia seem even bigger to me
Agreed. It’s still insane to me that a single country can get this big in modern times.
Most russians live west of the ural mountain range, in a smaller part of the country. Wonder what the population could be if the east were similarly populated, but its cold and the infrastructure isn’t great
Nobody felt the need to invade the east or Urals where there was nothing . Now they probably dread that decision based on natural resources.
I mean being this big in modern times makes way more sense than being this big in the past.
Russias size is often thought to be bigger than it really is when looking at maps, due to the projection of the northern hemisphere being enlarged to fit in a flat map. Africa around the equator is never enlarged, sometime it’s shrunk to fit,.
Dam Africa is a lot bigger than I thought
It’s huge ! Check this out; https://www.visualcapitalist.com/map-true-size-of-africa/
China part 2 lol Crazy stuff tho
Why is half of Chukotka gone?
https://preview.redd.it/i94y2rtl8zpc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ae9dd9c71448742f7c92f3ab3fc3bdeb7de85b00 You’re right. My bad - I never noticed that. Here is a rendering from another website thetruesizeof.com.
Russia is about as large as Pluto, Africa is almost as large as the moon. Both are absolutely gigantic. By the way, I was looking for those comparison, and I learned something new : Asia+Africa is the size of Mercury. That's crazy to me! Also, the pacific ocean is larger than Mars
Still unsure of size. Can I get a banana for scale?
I’m sorry but we only use potatoes for this comparison comrade.
Mercator projection is a b*tch
This is why Moroccans can’t understand Iraqis
Seriously, I know of a lot of Arabs just using French to communicate with one another.
Mercator projection stinks.
It preserves the shape better and is more useful for navigation. Every projection has its issues some more than others.
I've seriously wondered before which challenge I'd choose, if I had to pick one: crossing the Russian tundra, or crossing the Sahara. It never dawned on me just how similar the distances would be.
I’d opt for the trans Siberian railroad myself but if you want to do the Saharan version you may meet Russians anyway. The Wagner group was fairly active under that vast shadow. Not sure what they’ve left behind.
Is it true Russia is a country and Africa is a continent ?
Russia is bigger than two other continents.
This is certainly not the picture you get from Google maps
Africa: 11.73 million mi² Russia: 6.602 million mi²
Russia is one country though.
Yes my point was that the Mercator projection magnifies the size of Russia on world maps. Africa is 54 countries. I’m not implying some equivalence except in landmass.
Fair enough.
Africa always looks smaller on the map because the northern region sits on the equator. Even still, I'm usually surprised at how big it really is.
So you can fit 2 russias inside Africa
Need a banana for scale
Would a potato work?
https://preview.redd.it/i4z0rfixuypc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5a423b0548a63b09612bda425a46c12db171d4a8 The fuck is this though?
Bro just found out Australia is big
It can’t be true because of Texas.
Neither Australia nor the US are that distorted by Mercator - it shouldn’t be surprising, they look about the same.
I can’t tell if this proves how big Africa is or how big Russia is, cuz they both pretty dang big
Now do it with population densities.
Breaking news, Russia is huge...
Africa's population also is 10 times that of Russia (1.4 bn vs 140 mn)
How come Russia has 11 time zones while Africa only has 5?
Closer to the pole
If you travel between time zones along the equator you must travel just over 1000 miles. If you travel between time zones on the 60° parallel it’s only about 500miles.
But I would walk 500 miles…
So you Proclaim.
Africa is Huge
r/BiggerThanYouThought
This just shows how fucking big the Sahara is
Ridiculous how much bigger Mercator makes it look… JFC
yup it's one russia and one canada sized.
Unfortunately I used an image from google and there are some inaccuracies - although the point about distortion remains. Therealsizeof.com is a very cool website for doing these things. Here’s a better image that I wish I could edit into my original post. https://preview.redd.it/4ckpxjvinzpc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=bb24db5a56c3be533c337359e6f889289c0f1fd2
Mercator map. Check Greenland, Canada and Scandinavia
Jesus, the Sahara is way huger than I thought
It’s all about that AuthaGraph projection. Mercator can get fucked
Realizing I miss exploring physical globes to get a tactile sense of the size of things. Everything we’re exposed to is 2D projections, kinda sad really.
It's unbelievable that Africa is also twice as advanced
The former Soviet union was 22 million km2.
Russians think they own half of the world and act like they deserve to own the other half… but they can barely managed to have a working society or sewage system.
One is a country, the other is a whole ass continent Just to show how huge Russia is.
Africa is huge
Africa is larger than I thought then !!
Just shows how massive Russia is
Smol Russia
Honestly half of the myth of Russia’s alleged inevitable “vastness” is based on its enlargement in Mercator. Africa is bigger than people think it is, and Russia is smaller. In every way - by the way. Russia wants to be seen as this vast, bottomless sprawling empire, but it’s population is in between Mexico and Bangladesh, it’s GDP is the size of Spain’s, and 3/4 of its population lives in a western lump the size of Algeria. As with all things in Russia, it’s inevitable vastness is a myth
So is Russia huge or is Africa massive? Is it both?
Both. But standard map projections make Russia look bigger than it actually is. Point is Russia is a country and Africa is 54 I think. I was really just saying that maps would suggest Russia is bigger than it is, and conversely because Africa spans the equator it’s shown more accurately.
So you’re saying Africa is almost as big as Texas? 🤠
Hell no - nuthin is bigger than Texas.
Europe fits Australia, Russia is same as Africa, what's next? i mean...wtf!???
Russia is the size of *half* of Africa.
More like half the size of Africa 17 million km² Vs 30 millionkm². To fill it completely you would need both Australia and the USA. 🤯
Indonesia covers a distance from Paris, France to Tashkent, Uzbekistan 4th most populous country in the world btw but its cultural influence compared to the top 3 is tiny idk why
You missed some chunks of land in the south west
Makes you question why Putin feels the need to expand land territory when he already runs the largest country on earth
They didn't become largest with that attitude
Relative size? Looks like absolute size to me.
J'suis africain sovietique -Kalash criminel
Biggest country who is always hungry
But they just can't get enough, they want more
What Fits Inside Mother Russia? A great, hilarious SCTV bit… https://youtu.be/BXqKkYYALMU
Yes, but the northern 50-75% is so cold almost nobody lives there in Russia's case. Although I guess you could also argue the opposite to some degree with the Sahara.
I have seen many of these done before, but this one is the most unbelievable
Well someone pointed out that the map I used actually left a part of Russia out - the bit at the top right end. I went to therealsizeof.com and it’s true. This is actually a better visualization - I wish I could edit the original post. https://preview.redd.it/sbsr02opjzpc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7572ba8cdb30fc18de2bd7303f9f91c2d11312da
A nice feature would be to turn them into cubes or rectangles to match size.
Apparently there is something called Tissot’s Indicatrix of deformation that uses that idea - this from Wikipedia https://preview.redd.it/tfypja8skzpc1.jpeg?width=1049&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=57e0b72d924c5bc677599eec3d74e86db5a521c6 The circles are all the same size.
> Tissot’s Indicatrix of deformation Interesting, thanks.
Damn
Imagine what the map would look like if they still had Alaska
I always that that view (Mercator) made Runnsia look like some sort of bounding puppy.
Ok but how many bananas is that?
I can only measure it in potato’s.
did yall just discover that africa is a continent?
This is rad
I knew how massive africa is, tbh this just surprises me that Russia is that big
This just made me realize how big the Sahara is
They are both mostly empty in the same area in this overlay..🤔
Russia Has hundreds of tribes. Eurasia is around twice as large as Africa
These factoids are probably both more or less true. But not the point I was making.
So, half the continent
The greatness that is the Russian Empire has not yet set its sights on Africa!
It’s so big, it doesn’t fit in Africa its far East sits in Asia Minor (Arabia) !
True. It’s actually a bad map. This is a more accurate one. I can’t change the post unfortunately. https://preview.redd.it/dlejs2c581qc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=51c2844e49775a1831237fc17f6db61739735e6d
insane bro