![](https://www.birdsoutsidemywindow.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/map_africa_3-7_usa_thetruesize_w_logo_borderlines2.jpg)
6 March 2024
While visiting southern Africa in January I was impressed at how large the continent is. Africa is huge – so big that the contiguous U.S. can fit inside it three times, as shown above.
For instance, the air distance from top to bottom of Africa – Tunis, Tunisia to Cape Town, South Africa – is farther than Seattle to Toyko.
![](https://www.birdsoutsidemywindow.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/map_africa_w_countries_tunisia_annot_wiki.jpg)
![](https://www.birdsoutsidemywindow.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/map_north_pacific_annot_wiki-1024x626.jpg)
This animation shows how Africa compares in size to other continents.
Asia is the only continent larger than Africa.
![](https://www.birdsoutsidemywindow.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/map_world_continents_wiki.jpg)
And Asia is the only continent with a larger human population than Africa’s. Africa comes in second in both cases.
![](https://www.birdsoutsidemywindow.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/population-by-continent-annot_wiki-1024x533.jpg)
To get an idea of this on your own, try thetruesize.com to see how big things are.
(credits are in the captions)
Thank you for this excellent visual post.