Countries, plus famous states, territories, islands and lakes. Resize one to match their real area ratio. Each pair is drawn from the world's countries plus famous states, territories, islands and lakes, compared by total area; a lake never meets a country on its shore.
A daily size-comparison game. Two places are shown side by side, and you resize the second until its area against the first looks right. Map projections distort size badly, so this trains a sense of how big places really are: Greenland against Africa, Texas against France, Lake Victoria against Ireland. If you've played Magnitudle's Geography mode, it's the same idea, with daily maps for the US states and 16 country maps. (Geographys isn't affiliated with Magnitudle.)
How it works
1Two places a day. The first stays put; the second is the one you resize.
2Drag sideways on the map, or use the slider, to grow or shrink it until the size ratio looks right.
3Lock it in to see the real ratio. Exact scores 1,000; twice or half the real size scores about 340.
4Sizes are total area, water included; on US States, land area, to match the outlines.
5Beside countries and regions, the maps mix in famous islands, lakes and a couple of peninsulas. None is ever paired with the place it's part of, and a lake never meets a place on its shore.
Tips
Forget the web map in your head. It stretches places far from the Equator, so Greenland, Canada and Russia are much smaller than they look.
Think in ratios, not shapes. Ask how many of the smaller place would fit in the bigger one.
Use pairs you know as a ruler. If you know France against Spain, use it to judge France against something else.
Water counts. Countries are measured by total area, so big lakes add to the total.
Questions
How is it scored?
Out of 1,000 a pair. An exact ratio scores 1,000; 10% off scores about 860; twice or half the real size scores about 340.
Why is the US smaller than I expected?
The outline is the contiguous 48 states, since Alaska and Hawaii are too far off to draw as one shape, so it uses the area of those 48 plus DC. Alaska can come up on its own.
Where do the areas come from?
The credits page lists the source for every map, from country areas to US Census figures for the states.
When is there a new daily?
Every day at midnight where you are. Everyone gets the same puzzle on the same date, and practice rounds are random.
Why maps get size wrong
Gerardus Mercator made his famous projection in 1569 for sailors: it keeps compass directions true, so a straight line on the map is a constant bearing. The price is size. Places far from the Equator are stretched, so Greenland looks as big as Africa when Africa is about fourteen times larger.
Every flat map distorts something: size, shape, distance or direction. The map projections tool in Globe Atlas shows a country on nine of them, which is a good way to see how much the familiar one exaggerates.