Japan vs Sweden

Sweden is 1.2 times larger than Japan — 450,295 against 377,915 km². Japan is 12 times more populous than Sweden — 123,366,734 against 10,596,620 people.

Side by side

Population density

Japan is 14 times more densely populated than Sweden — 326 against 24 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, Sweden on the right.
• Different currencies: the Japanese yen and the Swedish krona.
• 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.

Sweden

Sweden has roughly 267,000 islands, more than any other country, though only a small fraction are inhabited. Around seventy percent of it is forest, and a seventh lies above the Arctic Circle. Its right of public access lets anyone walk and camp on most uncultivated land.

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.