South Africa covers 1,219,090 km² on the new Equal Earth world map, 0.9% of all land on Earth. It ranks 25th of 237 countries worldwide and 9th in Africa. At 29° latitude the old Mercator map inflates area by about 1.3×, drawing it closer to 1,592,863 km², a difference of roughly 31%.
For scale, South Africa is roughly the same size as Mali (1,240,192 km²).
You could fit 3 of Zimbabwe inside South Africa.
South Africa: key figures
| True area | 1,219,090 km² |
| World rank | 25th |
| Share of world land | 0.9% |
| Rank in Africa | 9th / 58 |
| Old-map (Mercator) inflation | 1.3× |
| Apparent size on Mercator | 1,592,863 km² |
Largest countries in Africa (true area)
| Africa | |
|---|
| Algeria | 2,381,741 km² |
| Democratic Republic of the Congo | 2,344,858 km² |
| Sudan | 1,878,000 km² |
| Libya | 1,759,540 km² |
| Chad | 1,284,000 km² |
| Niger | 1,267,000 km² |