Costa Rica vs Italy

Italy is 5.9 times larger than Costa Rica — 301,340 against 51,100 km². Italy is 11 times more populous than Costa Rica — 58,915,656 against 5,152,950 people.

Side by side

Population density

Italy is 1.9 times more densely populated than Costa Rica — 196 against 101 people per km². Density is where area and population interact, and it often reverses the impression the headline figures give — a large country with a small population can feel emptier than a small crowded one by an enormous margin.

Practical differences

• Different currencies: the Costa Rican colón and the Euro.
• Different continents — North America and Europe.

Costa Rica

Costa Rica covers about 0.03 percent of the Earth's surface but holds roughly five percent of its known species. More than a quarter of the country is protected, forest cover has roughly doubled since the 1980s, and it runs on close to 100 percent renewable electricity most years. It has around sixty volcanoes, six of them active.

Italy

Italy has three of Europe's most active volcanoes — Etna, Stromboli and Vesuvius — and Stromboli has been erupting more or less continuously for at least 2,000 years. It has more UNESCO World Heritage sites than any other country. The Alps and Apennines mean about three-quarters of the land is mountain or hill.

Neutral facts only. Nothing here addresses politics, government, economics or which country is preferable in any respect — population is the one figure that dates, and it carries its year.