The icon map was designed to make navigation on the Earth's oceans easier, but it came with a cost: the farther a place lies from the equator, the more dramatically its size is exaggerated.

On Sept. 4, 2026, the United Nations General Assembly endorsed the Equal Earth projection, an equal-area world map published in 2018, and encouraged governments, schools, media, and technology platforms to use it wherever the comparative size of continents matters.

The graphic above shows that map, using the free Equal Earth wall map published by cartographer Tom Patterson, one of the projection's three creators, with vote details from UN resolution A/80/L.104 and the UN's meetings coverage.

The Old Map vs. the New Map

Every flat map has to give something up, and the two below make different trade-offs.

Mercator, on top, keeps compass bearings straight and pays for it in area, stretching land more as it approaches the poles. Equal Earth, beneath it, keeps area exact and lets shapes bend slightly instead. Africa, Canada, and Greenland are highlighted on both so you can see what happens to each when the projection changes.

Gerardus Mercator designed his map in 1569 for sailors. A straight line on it follows a constant compass bearing, which made it indispensable at sea and, much later, useful for seamless online maps.

The trade-off is that it stretches the world more and more as you move away from the equator. At 60° north, roughly the latitude of Oslo or Anchorage, land is drawn four times too large. At 80° north, it is drawn 33 times too large.