Total & land area: El Salvador vs Ethiopia size comparison

Ethiopia is 52.5 times bigger by total area compared to El Salvador: 426,373 sq mi vs 8,124 sq mi. Without inland water, the land area of Ethiopia is 435,716 sq mi vs 8,000 sq mi for El Salvador — a 54.5 times difference in territory size.

El Salvador ranks 149/197 by total surface area vs 26/197 for Ethiopia.
El Salvador occupies 0.01% of the land mass of all countries, compared with 0.76% for Ethiopia.
57.7% of El Salvador's area is agricultural land vs 34.1% in Ethiopia.
El Salvador has 0.03% of the world's agricultural land area — Ethiopia has 0.81%.
27.5% of El Salvador is covered by forests, compared to 14.9% in Ethiopia.
0.01% of the world's forests are in El Salvador, and 0.42% are in Ethiopia.

True size map comparison: El Salvador vs Ethiopia

See how El Salvador and Ethiopia 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

	El Salvador	Ethiopia
Total area	8,124 sq mi	426,373 sq mi
Size difference ratio	1	52.5
Total area rank	149/197	26/197
Share of all countries' surface area	0.004%	0.22%
Land area	8,000 sq mi	435,716 sq mi
Land area difference ratio	1	54.5
Land area rank	150/197	25/197
Share of all countries' land area	0.01%	0.76%
Population	6,338,193	132,059,767
Population density	799 ppl/mi²	319 ppl/mi²

Surface area by type

	El Salvador	Ethiopia
Forest area	2,202 sq mi	65,056 sq mi
Forest area as share of land	27.5%	14.9%
Forest area rank	136/196	40/196
World's forests share	0.01%	0.42%
Agricultural land area	4,617 sq mi	148,483 sq mi
Agricultural land share	57.7%	34.1%
Agricultural land area rank	135/194	34/194
Share of global agricultural land	0.03%	0.81%
Arable land	2,784 sq mi	63,321 sq mi
Arable land share	34.8%	14.5%
Arable land area rank	117/191	19/191
Permanent cropland	618 sq mi	7,942 sq mi
Permanent cropland share	7.72%	1.82%
Permanent cropland area rank	92/192	21/192
Water area	123.9 sq mi	0 sq mi
Water as share of total area	1.53%	0%
Water area rank	123/197	175/197
Roads length	5,600 mi	74,671 mi
Land borders length	367 mi	3,682 mi
Coastline length	190.8 mi	0 mi
Share of marine protected waters	0.8%	n/a

El Salvador vs Ethiopia size on the map

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

GeoRank.org/size/el-salvador/ethiopia | CC BY

The map above outlines the borders of El Salvador and Ethiopia 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.