Bangladesh is one of the most densely populated countries. (representative photo)
A Twitter thread explaining population density around the world with the help of data visualization is gaining traction among users. Posted by Twitter user Tim Urban, it shows which parts of the planet have the highest population density and where it is least populated. This thread is based on an analysis done by Alasdair Rai, a researcher and data analysis expert. According to Mr Rai, the analysis is based on EU global human settlement data which is freely available.
The data shows the spread of the population across continents. In the United States, the East and Southeast are densely populated compared to the rest of the country. New Jersey has the highest population density in the United States, while Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota have the lowest population density.
In the case of India, the Indo-Gangetic plain is one of the most densely populated regions on Earth, the population density data further shows. The bars representing the number of people living in one square kilometer are placed extremely close to each other in this part, while the extreme north is less populated.
Southeast Asia. Java is off the hook. pic.twitter.com/IKzDgucVlN
— Tim Urban (@waitbutwhy) 20 July 2022
This thread further shows that Southeast Asia has the most densely populated cities, chief among them the Indonesian capital Jakarta which is on track to overtake Tokyo as the world’s most populous city by 2030. It further stated that with a population of 143 million, Java is the most populous island on Earth.
According to the Twitter thread, India’s neighboring country Bangladesh is one of the most densely populated countries on the planet and almost everyone in China is in the Southeast.
Europe and Australia are the least dense continents, with one of the tweets showing the graph showing very few times in Iceland.
The post was widely discussed on Twitter, in which billionaire Elon Musk also took part. “The Earth is basically empty of humans,” he said while replying to the now viral thread.
Earth is basically empty of humans
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) 20 July 2022
“Humans are consuming natural resources at a much faster rate than on Earth. Species are going extinct 1000 times faster than the natural background rate,” environmentalist Leilani Munter said.
The number crunching on which this Twitter thread is based was originally done in 2020 by Mr. Rai. He explained that the maps use 1 km x 1 km data and that the height of the bar represents the number of people living in any one square.
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