France vs Indonesia

Indonesia is 3.0 times larger than France — 1,904,569 against 643,801 km². Indonesia is 4.2 times more populous than France — 285,721,236 against 68,720,337 people.

Side by side

Population density

Indonesia is 1.4 times more densely populated than France — 150 against 107 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

• They drive on opposite sides — France on the right, Indonesia on the left.
• Different currencies: the Euro and the Indonesian rupiah.
• Indonesia spans 3 time zones, so "local time" there is not a single answer.
• Different continents — Europe and Asia.

France

Mont Blanc on the Italian border is 4,806 m, the highest point in western Europe. Counting its overseas departments, France spans twelve time zones — more than any other country — and its exclusive economic zone is the second largest in the world. The Gouffre Mirolda and other Alpine systems make it one of the great caving countries.

Indonesia

The largest archipelago in the world: official surveys count more than 17,000 islands, of which around 6,000 are inhabited, spread over 5,100 km of ocean. Indonesia sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire and has about 130 active volcanoes, more than any other country. It also holds more of the world's remaining tropical peatland than anywhere except the Congo basin.

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.