As a proud Texan, I've heard all the jokes about how everything is bigger (and better, if you ask me) in the Lone Star State. Even the shape of Texas has become iconic and is easily one of the most recognizable on a map of the United States. In college, I drove all the way across the state to spend Spring Break in South Padre (I know, I know) and found myself wondering on that never-ending drive, "How big is Texas compared to everywhere else?"
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How Big is Texas?
It's pretty apparent that it's one of the most prominent American states (smaller than Alaska but bigger than California) but how does it compare to the rest of the world? If you've ever driven from a Northern Texas city like Dallas down to the Mexico border, you can appreciate just how big Texas is. It's 268,596 square miles to be exact.
In case you also found yourself wondering how Texas compares to the size of random countries like Madagascar or the United Kingdom, then we've got some fun visuals for you. Sparefoot recently created a definitive infographic that shows just how big the great state of Texas compared to other countries around the world.
To create the graphic, they consulted TheTrueSize.com, a website that projects the actual geographic size of a country without distortion. Common map services like Google Maps use Mercator projections, which warp countries' actual dimensions to preserve their shape the further they appear from the equator.
The representations in this graphic illustrate the actual geographic size of Texas and each country. Sparefoot also factored in extra data about each nation for their comparisons (Population, GDP and square miles).
So what's the verdict? Iceland is only slightly larger than the Houston metro, which is one of the biggest in the country, but it still makes the graphic surprising. According to Sparefoot, Texas would be considered the 39th largest country by area if it were considered a nation. We are just swallowing up Iraq and Japan on these maps.
Below, you'll also see how Texas fits inside bigger nations like Brazil and Australia but how it is larger than France and Spain. Channel your inner-geographer and see how big Texas is.
Via SpareFoot
Editor's Note: This article was originally published in 2017.
READ MORE: Map Shows What Texas Would Look Like Divided as 9 Equal States
