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The Equal Earth projection

Equal Earth is the equal-area projection used by the new world map. It was designed in 2018 by Bojan Šavrič, Tom Patterson and Bernhard Hürger for Natural Earth — the same open map-data project that powers this site's countries.

How the projection works

An equal-area projection is a formula for drawing the round globe on a flat page while conserving relative area: one square kilometre of land anywhere on the map occupies the same visual space as one square kilometre anywhere else. Mercator, the old map standard, cannot do this — it inflates size with latitude, growing toward the poles.

Why it looks (reassuringly) familiar

Most earlier equal-area maps — like the Mollweide or sinusoidal — look visibly strange: stretched, or distorted into oval scaffolds. Equal Earth was deliberately designed to keep the soft oval silhouette of the world map people grew up with, so the correction is in size, not in shape.

Adoption

In 2026 the United Nations moved its official maps to Equal Earth, which is why "the new world map" looks the way it does today. The projection is open and free to use: see the old map vs new map, side by side.

Proyección de Mercator — la distorsión del antiguo mapa del mundo, explicada Mercator vs Equal Earth — ¿cuál es el mejor mapa del mundo?Mapa mundial antiguo vs nuevo

Datos y cifras

Is the Equal Earth projection perfectly accurate?

No map of a round planet drawn on a flat page is perfect — every flat map trades one thing for another. Equal Earth's trade is that it preserves relative area everywhere. Its shape is close to familiar world-map globes, though not perfect, and distances are slightly approximate, like on any flat map.

Why did the UN choose Equal Earth?

The UN's 2026 switch to Equal Earth picks a projection whose primary promise is honest area: countries appear at their true relative sizes, which matters in an official map used by schools, agencies and publications worldwide. Equal Earth was chosen in part because it corrects area without looking unfamiliar.

How is Equal Earth different from Mercator?

Mercator (1569) keeps compass bearings straight for navigation but inflates area toward the poles — Greenland looks about 14 times larger than its true relative size. Equal Earth (2018) does the opposite: shapes of high-latitude countries are slightly altered, but every area is true. On this site you can compare the two side by side.