Russia vs Spain

Russia is 34 times larger than Spain — 17,098,242 against 505,370 km². Russia is 2.9 times more populous than Spain — 143,513,328 against 49,355,143 people.

Side by side

Population density

Spain is 12 times more densely populated than Russia — 98 against 8 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 Russian ruble and the Euro.
• Russia spans 11 time zones, so "local time" there is not a single answer.

Russia

The largest country in the world by land area, close to twice the size of the next one, and it spans eleven time zones. Lake Baikal in Siberia is the deepest lake on Earth at 1,642 m and holds roughly a fifth of the world's unfrozen fresh water — more than all five North American Great Lakes combined. Russia and China each border fourteen countries, more than any other state.

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.