Both maps below show Democratic Republic of the Congo highlighted. At 3° Mercator inflates Democratic Republic of the Congo by only about 0.25%, so the two maps largely agree on it. Watch what the old map does to Zambia beside it. That contrast is why the new world map matters.
At 3°, Democratic Republic of the Congo sits in the band the old map drew almost honestly. It is one of the regions Mercator quietly under-represented, and that is exactly what the new Equal Earth map restores.
Democratic Republic of the Congo: key figures
| True area | On the old Mercator map | Distortion vs truth |
|---|
| Democratic Republic of the Congo | 2,344,858 km² | 2,350,720 km² | 1.00× |
| Greenland | 2,166,086 km² | 25,576,494 km² | 11.8× |
| Africa | 30,370,000 km² | n/a | n/a |
Old maps drew Democratic Republic of the Congo at about 2,350,720 km². The truth is 2,344,858 km², a difference of 0.25% that school atlases carried for centuries.