Japan vs Spain

Spain is 1.3 times larger than Japan — 505,370 against 377,915 km². Japan is 2.5 times more populous than Spain — 123,366,734 against 49,355,143 people.

Side by side

Population density

Japan is 3.3 times more densely populated than Spain — 326 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

• They drive on opposite sides — Japan on the left, Spain on the right.
• Different currencies: the Japanese yen and the Euro.
• Spain spans 2 time zones, so "local time" there is not a single answer.
• Different continents — Asia and Europe.

Japan

A 2023 government survey using digital mapping counted 14,125 islands, more than double the long-quoted figure of 6,852. About three-quarters of the land is mountain, so nearly everyone lives on a narrow band of coastal plain. Japan sits where four tectonic plates meet and records a fifth of the world's magnitude-6-and-above earthquakes.

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.