Saint Helena: old map vs new map

Both maps below show Saint Helena highlighted. At 12° Mercator inflates Saint Helena by only about 5%, so the two maps largely agree on it. Watch what the old map does to South Africa beside it. That contrast is why the new world map matters.

At 12°, Saint Helena 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.

Saint Helena: key figures

	True area	On the old Mercator map	Distortion vs truth
Saint Helena	394 km²	413 km²	1.05×
Greenland	2,166,086 km²	25,576,494 km²	11.8×
Africa	30,370,000 km²	n/a	n/a

Old maps drew Saint Helena at about 413 km². The truth is 394 km², a difference of 5% that school atlases carried for centuries.

Africa on the old map vs the new map →Saint Helena country page: true area, rank and comparisons →The old world map vs the new world map →