A map can look like a window onto the world. It isn’t. To put a round planet on a flat page, every map has to make choices—and those choices affect how we see the size and shape of places.
The map many of us grew up with uses the Mercator projection, created in 1569 to help sailors navigate. It does that job well: directions and local shapes are largely preserved. But the further a place is from the equator, the larger it appears. Greenland can look comparable in size to Africa, even though Africa is about 14 times larger.
That distortion isn’t proof that Mercator is a bad map. It reminds us that no flat map can show everything accurately at once. A projection suited to navigation may not be the best choice for a classroom wall, an atlas or a graphic comparing the size of continents.
The Equal Earth projection, developed by cartographers in 2018, is an equal-area map: it represents the relative size of landmasses more accurately. It still changes some shapes and angles, as every flat projection must. But when the point is to compare how much land different regions occupy, it offers a clearer picture.
That distinction was at the heart of the #CorrectTheMap campaign. Africa No Filter helped bring attention to the issue, arguing that the familiar map’s distortions affect how people imagine Africa’s scale and place in the world. The campaign worked with cartographers, mapping specialists and political partners to promote Equal Earth as an alternative—not to remove Mercator from every use.
On 4 September 2026, 164 countries voted at the UN General Assembly in support of a resolution endorsing a more accurate representation of the world. It was a significant political signal, but it did not automatically replace the maps used by schools, publishers, governments or online platforms.
That is the practical work ahead. Organisations that publish maps will need to decide which projection suits their purpose. Teachers and textbook publishers may choose Equal Earth when comparing the size of continents. Digital mapping services may use different projections depending on whether people are navigating, exploring or learning. And users will need to understand that every map is designed for a particular job.
So the question is not simply, “Which map is right?” It is: “Right for what?” Mercator remains useful for navigation. Equal Earth is better for showing relative area. Knowing the difference helps us read maps more critically—and understand that the way the world is drawn can shape what we think we know about it.
The UN vote put the issue on the record. Whether it changes the maps people actually see will depend on what institutions do next. A fairer projection can make it harder to mistake Africa’s vast scale, or to treat it as a small margin on someone else’s map.
While a new projection won’t, by itself, change how the world treats African countries, nor tell the full story of a continent made up of many different countries and peoples, it can correct a misleading visual reference point—and give people a more accurate starting place for understanding the vastness of Africa in relation to the rest of the world.
