Both maps below show Niue highlighted. At 19° Mercator inflates Niue by only about 12%, so the two maps largely agree on it. Watch what the old map does to Norfolk Island beside it. That contrast is why the new world map matters.
At 19°, Niue 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.
Niue: key figures
| True area | On the old Mercator map | Distortion vs truth |
|---|
| Niue | 260 km² | 291 km² | 1.1× |
| Greenland | 2,166,086 km² | 25,576,494 km² | 11.8× |
| Africa | 30,370,000 km² | n/a | n/a |
Old maps drew Niue at about 291 km². The truth is 260 km², a difference of 12% that school atlases carried for centuries.