France vs Venezuela

Venezuela is 1.4 times larger than France — 912,050 against 643,801 km². France is 2.4 times more populous than Venezuela — 68,720,337 against 28,516,896 people.

Side by side

Population density

France is 3.4 times more densely populated than Venezuela — 107 against 31 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 Euro and the Venezuelan bolívar soberano.
• Different continents — Europe and South America.

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.

Venezuela

Angel Falls drops 979 m from the top of Auyán-tepui, the highest uninterrupted waterfall in the world — so high that in the dry season much of the water turns to mist before it lands. The tepuis are flat-topped sandstone table mountains, each an island of species cut off for millions of years. Lake Maracaibo sees more lightning than anywhere else on Earth, around 250 strikes per km² a year.

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.