Greece vs Switzerland

Greece is 3.2 times larger than Switzerland — 131,957 against 41,277 km². Greece is 1.1 times more populous than Switzerland — 10,413,962 against 9,092,436 people.

Side by side

Population density

Switzerland is 2.8 times more densely populated than Greece — 220 against 79 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 Swiss franc.

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.

Switzerland

The most mountainous country in Europe: the Alps cover about sixty percent of it and it has 48 peaks over 4,000 m. The Gotthard Base Tunnel, 57 km long, is the longest and deepest rail tunnel in the world. Switzerland has four official languages and about 1,500 lakes.

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.