Total & land area: Afghanistan vs Malawi size comparison

Afghanistan is 5.5 times bigger by total area compared to Malawi: 251,827 sq mi vs 45,747 sq mi. Without inland water, the land area of Afghanistan is 251,827 sq mi vs 36,402 sq mi for Malawi — a 6.92 times difference in territory size.

Afghanistan ranks 40/197 by total surface area vs 98/197 for Malawi.
Afghanistan occupies 0.44% of the land mass of all countries, compared with 0.06% for Malawi.
58.4% of Afghanistan's area is agricultural land vs 64.2% in Malawi.
Afghanistan has 0.8% of the world's agricultural land area — Malawi has 0.13%.
1.85% of Afghanistan is covered by forests, compared to 22.4% in Malawi.
0.03% of the world's forests are in Afghanistan, and 0.05% are in Malawi.

True size map comparison: Afghanistan vs Malawi

See how Afghanistan and Malawi compare in true size on the map. Drag the outlines to different latitudes to see how the Mercator projection affects their apparent size.

Total size and land area comparison

	Afghanistan	Malawi
Total area	251,827 sq mi	45,747 sq mi
Size difference ratio	5.5	1
Total area rank	40/197	98/197
Share of all countries' surface area	0.13%	0.02%
Land area	251,827 sq mi	36,402 sq mi
Land area difference ratio	6.92	1
Land area rank	40/197	107/197
Share of all countries' land area	0.44%	0.06%
Population	42,647,492	21,655,286
Population density	179 ppl/mi²	626 ppl/mi²

Surface area by type

	Afghanistan	Malawi
Forest area	4,666 sq mi	8,169 sq mi
Forest area as share of land	1.85%	22.4%
Forest area rank	119/196	106/196
World's forests share	0.03%	0.05%
Agricultural land area	147,167 sq mi	23,359 sq mi
Agricultural land share	58.4%	64.2%
Agricultural land area rank	35/194	82/194
Share of global agricultural land	0.8%	0.13%
Arable land	30,294 sq mi	15,444 sq mi
Arable land share	12%	42.4%
Arable land area rank	33/191	59/191
Permanent cropland	1,042 sq mi	772 sq mi
Permanent cropland share	0.41%	2.12%
Permanent cropland area rank	73/192	87/192
Water area	0 sq mi	9,345 sq mi
Water as share of total area	0%	20.4%
Water area rank	168/197	23/197
Roads length	21,688 mi	9,601 mi
Land borders length	3,720 mi	1,775 mi
Coastline length	0 mi	0 mi

Afghanistan vs Malawi size on the map

Data sources: World Bank | Agriculture & Rural Development (2026, retrieved 2026-04-06).

GeoRank.org/size/afghanistan/malawi | CC BY

The map above outlines the borders of Afghanistan and Malawi but is not accurate for size comparison because it's a 2d map with Mercator projection that distorts territories near the poles. The farther a country is from the equator, the more magnified it appears. More about country size projections.