Costa Rica vs Spain

Spain is 9.9 times larger than Costa Rica — 505,370 against 51,100 km². Spain is 9.6 times more populous than Costa Rica — 49,355,143 against 5,152,950 people.

Side by side

Population density

Costa Rica is slightly more densely populated, by 3.3% — 101 against 98 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.
• Spain spans 2 time zones, so "local time" there is not a single answer.
• 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.

Spain

After Switzerland, Spain is the most mountainous country in Europe, with an average elevation around 650 m. The Canary Islands sit off Africa, which is why part of Spain is on a different time zone and why Teide, at 3,715 m, is the country's highest point. Spain has more olive trees than any other country, around 340 million.

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.