Greece vs Ireland

Greece is 1.9 times larger than Ireland — 131,957 against 70,273 km². Greece is 1.9 times more populous than Ireland — 10,413,962 against 5,484,367 people.

Side by side

Population density

Greece is slightly more densely populated, by 1.1% — 79 against 78 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 — Greece on the right, Ireland on the left.

Greece

Somewhere between 1,200 and 6,000 islands depending on how you count a rock, of which about 227 are inhabited. Greece has roughly 13,700 km of coastline, the longest in the Mediterranean and eleventh longest in the world. No part of the mainland is more than about 137 km from the sea, and Mount Olympus reaches 2,917 m.

Ireland

The interior is a low limestone plain ringed by coastal mountains, which is why the rivers drain inward and the middle of the country is bog. The Cliffs of Moher run 14 km and reach 214 m. Ireland has no native snakes, and only one native reptile.

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.