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Rounding errors

This list does not order correctly, as it rounds the densities to the nearest whole number, which is not enough. For example, Australia is listed as less dense than Namibia when ordering, which is not correct. Greenman (talk) 06:57, 1 June 2017 (UTC)

100 most populous doesn't match linked page

The countries listed in the 100 most populous table don't match the first 100 countries in the list of countries by population.

Just as a simple example - the list in this page contains Israel, #98 by population, but does not contain Jordan - #91 by population. There may be more such errors. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.226.173.16 (talk) 07:25, 3 July 2017 (UTC)

carribean netherlands

it is not territory there 3 special municipalitys — Preceding unsigned comment added by I dont have a username for this (talk • contribs) 20:13, 9 September 2017 (UTC)

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Scotland .....

..... is missing. Northern Ireland, Wales and England are all present. My technical skills are insufficient to risk meddling with the table, would somebody please fix? Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:C7D:5E94:400:3496:C921:1CD9:E9B0 (talk) 20:12, 31 March 2018 (UTC)

No need for 2nd table, and it is incorrect

From a quick glance it is missing several countries with high population densities.

And it is difficult enough to maintain one table in rank order. So why 2 tables?

What is the purpose of the 2nd table? It should be deleted. --Timeshifter (talk) 18:43, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland

It doesn’t make any sense to include the above four, as they are not regarded as separate countries. Even the map used, is showing Britain as a whole, not as four separate countries. They should be omitted as soon as possible. 217.123.76.65 (talk) 09:14, 17 July 2018 (UTC)

Also, what would this list look like if we did this with other countries that are, in fact, part of several ‘lower, entities i.e. Russia, the US, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, Spain, etc. 217.123.76.65 (talk) 09:21, 17 July 2018 (UTC)
It is common in country lists to include some subnational areas. Especially if they are separated geographically. --Timeshifter (talk) 18:46, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

Convert template use

The template convert used in the tables doesn't seem to be used properly. In particular I don't see that it reaches the intent of rounding the figures used. For instance the area for Hong Kong was entered as 1,106.66 with a parameter of 0, but was still displaying two decimal digits, which is absurd. I changed the figure manually, to 1,106 which is not correct on purpose so that somebody can overhaul the whole rounding of this article.--Gciriani (talk) 11:58, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

UK vs constituent countries

Including England, Scotland, Wales etc separately but no entry for the UK as whole seems wrong to me. We don't list US states separately here even though they also have their own legislatures, laws etc. I suspect it's also partially driven by someone's political agenda. 65.240.194.232 (talk) 15:43, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

On the substance, I think you are entirely right. On the motivation, it would not surprise me. Reverted. Kahastok talk 18:31, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
I think a better justification for the subunits of the UK being on this list needs to be made on the talk page before they're just re-added. Why are they the only non-dependency subnational divisions on the list? Thinking of just deleting them myself. - ҉ Randwicked ҉ 23:04, 3 May 2020 (UTC)
If they get put back in without consensus, then please do!
I just removed them in this case. The inclusion criteria for this list are perfectly clear, and England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland do not meet those criteria. Kahastok talk 16:32, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

@Kahastok and Randwicked: Forgive me for restarting this, but doesn’t this list include constituent countries as an inclusion criteria? The constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands and Denmark are listed, for example (e.g. Curaçao, Sint Maarten, Greenland). — MarkH21talk 14:12, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

No, it doesn't. The inclusion criteria are ISO 3166-1 plus states with limited recognition. This is as stated by the second paragraph of the lede. No part of the inclusion criteria - or indeed any other part of the article - mentions constituent countries (a concept that is not well defined). Kahastok talk 14:57, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
Ah okay, thanks. I'll at least note in the lead that the list includes some constituent countries, as it's done at List of countries and dependencies by population, as it clarifies the situation for readers. — MarkH21talk 15:15, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
I'm not very keen on the wording from that article. It's rather misleading to treat "constituent country" as a meaningful category in its own right, since it encompasses a huge range of different statuses (the link actually goes to a disambiguation page). The Dutch Caribbean, Greenland and the Faroe Islands can reasonably be treated as dependent territories.
I have tried to come up with a wording that resolves this. Kahastok talk 16:26, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Ranks are incorrect

Starting from number 35 (Kuwait), multiple countries with same values have been given the next rank when they should be in one rank. Tons of clean-up needed. Hopefully, some editors can help out. •Shawnqual• 📚 • 💭 05:56, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

You're correct that if there are ties that the rank number should be the same, but there are no actual ties in population density among countries. Some countries appear to have the same population density because of rounding. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 17:39, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
AuH2ORepublican, Rounding off is also inconsistent in the list, some countries have rounded off to one place while most have been rounded off to 0. Any reason behind that? Rounding off could actually be done to 2 places so every country's value is unique. Then there would be no doubts in ties. If the values are not rounded off at all ( like currently is the case), how do we decide which countries comes above another? Do we list them alphabetically then? If yes, some are still out of order, like Kuwait coming before Jamaica. A note must be written at the top of the list, so future editors can know how to place ranks. I also think this template could help with automated ranks. •Shawnqual• 📚 • 💭 18:43, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
I agree that numbers should be presented to two decimal points so that it is more obvious that there are no ties, but rest assured that the odds of two countries having exactly the same population density (exact population divided by exact area) would be astronomically snall. There can't possibly be any actual ties, so there would be no reason to list countries alphabetically. AuH2ORepublican (talk) 23:15, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Area used for density includes internal water eg lakes

Is this the best approach? For some countries, eg the Netherlands (over 19% water), it makes a significant difference. Open water really isn't comparable in terms of possible uses to land. Peace Makes Plenty (talk) 14:35, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

True, but neither are mountains or dense forests. Where does one draw the line?---Ehrenkater (talk) 14:39, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

Well, we could draw it at the water's edge, since most (all?) of the figures for countries in Wikipedia include the amount that is water. The figures for Uganda, for instance, seem to include their 'share' of Lake Victoria. Countries with a coastline on the sea won't include the large stretches of water next to them. Peace Makes Plenty (talk) 14:48, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

Palestine

This [OR Edit] by AutoH2ORepublican on 5 March 2019 changed the long standing numbering of Palestine with the following reason "Removing number on list from de facto sovereign states that are not generally recognized as such (Palestine and Taiwan), which is consistent with the treatment of Kosovo". This is not only OR, it is incorrect as well.Selfstudier (talk) 18:31, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

In fact, Palestine was continuously numbered from 2008 until the above mentioned edit and when another editor tried to change it back to the long established consensus, it was reverted with a similarly OR and incorrect reason.I have restored the other editor's edit so as to reestablish the long time consensus.Selfstudier (talk) 04:09, 14 November 2019 (UTC)
It has been pointed out to me that the split into numbered and unnumbered entities only occurred for this article on the same day as the above mentioned OR Edit, therefore it is not the case that there was a prior long term consensus except in the sense that it was always numbered; however, this does not alter the OR/incorrect reasoning used in both cases mentioned.Selfstudier (talk) 18:14, 14 November 2019 (UTC)
Since it is unclear on what basis the rank numbering has been done I have amended the lead to reflect the basis on which it appears to have been done ie All 193 UN member states plus the Vatican have been number ranked.Selfstudier (talk) 14:57, 18 December 2019 (UTC)
@User:Selfstudier, firstly, just want to say that you handled this situation very nicely ;). I do notice, however, that there was an fundamental error made in the initial reasoning given by the editor that made this change in question: that Palestine does not fall into the category of "de facto sovereign states" that the editor removed from the ranks. Quite contrarily, Palestine is a de jure sovereign state which lacks de facto sovereignty (most de jure sovereign states have both).


Anyway, while back in 2008 there was such a group of states in existence that was comprised of the 193 UN member states plus Vatican City, Palestine was added to said group in (I think) 2010 (or maybe 2011,can't remember now). That is, they were granted the status of observer state within the UN, which status Vatican City also holds. SO, in short, there is no rational to include Vatican City but exclude Palestine, since Vatican City and Palestine both hold the exact same status in the UN (and are currently the only two states with such status). It is thus also false to equate it with states such as Kosovo which have limited recognition: Kosovo and others have no recognition as states by the UN body itself, which Palestine does. Firejuggler86 (talk) 22:21, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

Palestine

Palestine, known by its official name - the Palestinian Authority Contains According to scientific studies (not politically biased), 2.75 million people (as of 2011)

see - http://izsvideo.org/papers/Demographic%20Trends%20in%20Israel%202010%20Summary%20Update%20Eng,%20RL.pdf

The Gaza Strip

Should the Gaza Strip be listed as if it were a country, given that it is one of the most densely populated (and most important) areas on earth? Xlator (talk) 21:52, 20 May 2021 (UTC)

No. (this should be posted at the bottom of the page not up here).Selfstudier (talk) 22:01, 20 May 2021 (UTC)

Proposal to correct entry #5 on the list

Number 5 (in the default ordering) on the list is "United Kingdom" with a total area of 5.6 km2 and a population of 33,701. Obviously wrong, how has nobody noticed?

I believe the territory with area 5.6 km2 and population about 33,700 is Gibraltar. I'll come back and correct this if nobody objects. (Maybe Gibraltar somehow counts as part of the UK, I don't know and don't think it matters for this table, but it seems reasonable just to call it "Gibraltar".) There is a separate entry in the table for "Great Britain" meaning England, Scotland and Wales. Insulation2 (talk) 15:32, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

  • @Guarapiranga: As you have been making major edits to this table, I hope you will fix the error which Insulation2 found, remove the entry for the island of Great Britain, and restore the entry for the country called "United Kingdom" which is now missing. It would be a shame to roll back to the last correct version as you have done a lot of work. Bazza (talk) 16:25, 17 June 2021 (UTC)
 Done — 𝐆𝐮𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐢𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐚 ☎ 19:53, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

ALERT: Bad Data on Four Countries

While looking up stats on New Zealand, I just happened to notice that New Zealand, Colombia, Malaysia, and Bangladesh are all displaying the same area in km2 and mi2: 143,998 and 55,598. This of course is wrong and makes the density figures meaningless. A short check of the edit history reveals that this major error existed here since at least 1 January 2021; I didn't search further back.

I thought it would be easy to fix, but it seems the fix requires changing the density template, and I have better ways to spend my time. But I am alerting anyone who is up for it that it's a problem that needs fixing ASAP. It also wouldn't hurt for someone to check the whole list of countries to see if this kind of error exists anywhere else in the list. So this is my good deed for the day. Textorus (talk) 07:48, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

 Fixed. — 𝐆𝐮𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐢𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐚 ☎ 09:43, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

Israel population

Why Israel population on this page is different from the population from the Israel Wikipedia page? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Israel — Preceding unsigned comment added by Idilia1975 (talk • contribs) 05:17, 20 July 2021 (UTC)

Different sources and dates? — Guarapiranga ☎ 04:27, 20 July 2021 (UTC)

Taiwan in map

The table indicates that Taiwan's population density is 652 people per sq km, but the map uses the light red for 150-300 people per square km (hex #: EB372A) rather than the darker red of 500-700 people per square km (hex #: 76140C) as appropriate.

Not sure what the basis of the discrepancy is, or how to fix it, but it should be addressed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.237.76.57 (talk) 23:00, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

continents and international organizations

What do you think about including continents and some international organizations, without rank, just for comparison? E.g. Europe, Asia, European Union, ASEAN. Grillofrances (talk) 15:28, 24 April 2022 (UTC)

Vatican area

The table shows the area of the Vatican as "0" -- can we change the template to add some decimal places here? CapitalSasha ~ talk 00:58, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

The table shows 0 because the area in rounded km2 (and mi2) is zero. If you want a decimal added to this one, you'll need to add it to all the rest in the table. Bazza (talk) 10:13, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

Really? We can't use any kind of "significant figure" convention? CapitalSasha ~ talk 16:13, 24 April 2022 (UTC)

Countries of the United Kingdom

What do you think about including Countries of the United Kingdom, without rank, just for comparison? Grillofrances (talk) 15:34, 24 April 2022 (UTC)

What do you think of adding all the US states, Indian states, Canadian provinces, Chinese provinces, Australian states, without rank, just for comparison? What about all of the 35000-odd communes of France, just for comparison? If not, why not?
What do you think of adding the Roman Empire, the Aztec Empire, the Inca Empire, and any other historical empire you can think of, without rank, just for comparison? If not, why not?
What do you think of adding the top thousand largest islands of the world, without rank, just for comparison? If not, why not?
If we add one of these, there is no reason not to add all of them. This is a list of countries and dependencies (defined by ISO 3166-1). Trying to add random other entities "for comparison" detracts from that intent and creates huge problems in the future. Kahastok talk 19:24, 24 April 2022 (UTC)
Thanks for your opinion. There are only 4 countries of the UK in contrary to the 50 US states. I thought about them because they are named "countries" and this is a list of countries. They have separate national soccer teams. Scotland has its own banknotes. Grillofrances (talk) 02:54, 25 April 2022 (UTC)
There are many similar examples internationally. The details differ, sure, but fundamentally the UK is far from unique in being made up of "countries".
The problem is that the word "country" has a number of different and overlapping meanings. Our list criteria are required to be "unambiguous, objective, and supported by reliable sources". This is why we rely on ISO 3166-1, an objective external standard that leaves no reasonable room for ambiguity. Kahastok talk 20:01, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Japanese population in article

it seems that the population listed here is only 1/10th of the actual population 81.83.242.17 (talk) 02:20, 25 July 2022 (UTC)

Barbados

In the main table, I noticed that the population of Barbados is too small by 2 orders of magnitude (says 2,812 but should be 281,000). This seems to be a template issue. I don't know how to fix it, though, as the issue is not apparent for all other countries in the table. I haven't checked them one by one, but at least Japan (see other topic here) is also incorrect. Can anyone find a way to fix this without hard coding? AstroPickle (talk) 18:01, 25 July 2022 (UTC)

Ranking

The ranking isn't complete, many countries are missing 37.201.197.253 (talk) 05:04, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Feel free to add missing entries, supported by reliable sources. If you have extra information, you can paste it here and ask for someone else to insert it. Bazza (talk) 08:35, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

The Population of Northern Cyprus

The data of Northern Cyprus was added to the article with the edit summary:
"List of sovereign states includes Abkhazia Artsakh* Cook Islands* Kosovo* Niue* Northern Cyprus Western Sahara* Somaliland South Ossetia Taiwan* Transnistria*. Those with "*" are in List of countries and dependencies by population density."
Bazza 7 reverted the edit with the edit summary:
"it's only recognized by its occupying country, then it probably doesn't belong in a list of "countries and dependencies".
Bazza 7's approach is not only a political approach but also insufficient research (the word "probably").
Then, the data of Northern Cyprus was added to the article once again.
Bazza 7 reverted the edit with the edit summary:
"Do not edit-war: follow WP:BRD and start a discussion on this article's talk page."
The population data of Northern Cyprus must not be removed from the article.
Since the abuse of Bazza 7 is clear, s/he will be reported to the relevant board if s/he reverts once again.78.164.55.69 (talk) 17:55, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

If I understand the inclusion criteria correctly, we should include Northern Cyprus because it is in the List of states with limited recognition. I do have a question, does Cyprus include the population of Northern Cyprus in its statistics? Selfstudier (talk) 18:14, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
@Selfstudier: Thanks for your constructive reply, which satisfies the doubt I had earlier indicated with "probably" in my edit summary. I do not know the answer to your question. Bazza (talk) 18:25, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
(edit conflict) @78.164.55.69: I don't know who you are, nor what your allegiance is (although I could guess), but you need to be WP:CIVIL and not make accusations about editors as you have done above. I originally removed the data because it is not clear whether a political entity (North Cyprus) recognised only by the country which occupies it (Turkey) is permitted to be in that list, as stated in my edit summary. Redoing the edit, as 212.174.38.3 did, is against Wikipedia's policy of be bold, revert then discuss; that user was bold, I reverted but, rather than then opening a discussion, the user reinstated the removed information. You could have started that discussion yourself but chose, instead, to make accusations and threats. The introduction to the list states that it does not include entities not on ISO 3166-1, except for states with limited recognition and goes on to say that constituent countries that are not included on ISO 3166-1, and other entities not on ISO 3166-1 like the European Union, are not included. The questions for you or others who wish to see North Cyprus included in the list to answer are:
  1. is North Cyprus included in ISO 3166-1? If yes, then it can go in this article; if no then
  2. is North Cyprus a state with limited recognition? If yes, then it can go in this article; if no, then it cannot.
I might normally do that research myself when I have time, but in light of your accusations I'll leave it to you to answer these questions. Bazza (talk) 18:21, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
Northern Cyprus is included in the Wikipedia articles:
List of states with limited recognition, List of sovereign states, List of countries and dependencies by population, List of countries and dependencies by area, Armorial of sovereign states, Gallery of sovereign state flags. NC is included in "population" and "area", but not included in "density" (population/area) is out of logic as well. Since NC is included in List of states with limited recognition (as you asked), you seem to agree now that NC should be included in the article?78.164.55.69 (talk) 18:32, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
@78.164.55.69: Fine by me. For the future I hope you remember that this is how consensus is achieved to improve articles, and not by making unwarranted accusations and threats. Bazza (talk) 18:49, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
It is included in the List of states with limited recognition so we should include it. Still, we should not double count and so I think we should also find out if Cyprus includes the population of the North in its figures and if it does then an appropriate note should be made in the table, perhaps Demographics of Cyprus has the answer. Selfstudier (talk) 18:32, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
1,244,188 (population declared by Cyprus for the whole island) =
904,700 (population under the effective control of Cyprus; see Demographics of Cyprus; the southern part)
+ 382,836 (Northern Cyprus)
- 43348 (the deviation btw the Cyprus' prediction on north's population and the NC's official figure on NC's population).
So the note you wonder should be Cyprus' population includes the population prediction of the northern part by the Rep. of Cyprus.78.164.55.69 (talk) 19:36, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
Is there anyone who objects to the above added-note-offer for Cyprus, or who offers a nicer explanation?78.164.55.69 (talk) 19:40, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

Discrepancies

The area for Canada is wrong (9,093,507 km²) in both lists.

Iceland isn’t in the right spot on load, but is when the sort button is tapped.

(Re above 27 Jan 2022) Vatican still shows 0. Really old lists show 0.44. Falklands, Svalbard, Greenland can display decimal (in density column). MBG02 (talk) 09:16, 8 September 2022 (UTC)

Poland's area varies between the two lists. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Milaszewski (talk • contribs) 11:08, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:List of countries and dependencies by population which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 00:03, 29 November 2022 (UTC)

"List of countries by population denisty" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect List of countries by population denisty has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 March 6 § List of countries by population denisty until a consensus is reached. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 17:45, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Why the 7.5 million threshold for the list?

seems a bit artificial and it excludes a lot of countries like, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Paraguay, Slovakia I could go on with countless countries. If the goal is to exclude outliers I don't think it's needed to set the limit that high 2A02:AA7:4602:C6C7:78A5:F29B:CA0E:A4E1 (talk) 11:27, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

If you're referring to the second list in the article, it states clearly it's a subset of the first. It looks like it's for the most populated countries in the world and, if it's a subset, needs limits set suitable for its purpose. I don't know why the table is there: it offers nothing that the primary table doesn't other than having a different initial sort order.
I may be bold and delete it unless other editors disagree. Bazza (talk) 11:44, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
Yes, if the purpose is to exclude countries such as city states like Monaco and Singapore. I think it would make more sense to delete the second list and highlight those countries in some way in the main list if necessary 2A02:AA7:4601:A69C:850C:79D0:97A3:B451 (talk) 10:08, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
One way to address large countries would be use a population density map, which already exists. It could use an update and a better scale, though. Wizmut (talk) 21:54, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

For a few months during the summer of 2021, the entire table was repeatedly broken and repaired, sometimes by the same user (see the middle of this page of edits [1]). After the chaos had ended... all of the links to countries had changed to links to "Demographic of" that country. As far as I can tell no discussion had occurred about this change (at least not on this page), so let's have that discussion now.

I have personally never wanted to visit the "Demographics of X" page of any country when I click these links. I'm looking to get to the main page so I can see what most people see when they look up that country, or find a list of provinces, find out its location in the world or its sovereignty status.

Would be curious to hear from anyone else about this. Should the links point to the countries, or the demographics? Wizmut (talk) 22:45, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

Maps: is one better than three?

Right now there's a map that everyone sees at the top of the page, and then two maps at the bottom. They don't really add much, and in fact they seem more about the population of metropolitan areas rather than countries. The map in the lead is better, because it is clearly about countries.

I would propose that the two maps down below be removed and that the map at the top deserves an update (five years old at this time). Wizmut (talk) 22:51, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

Table of "real" countries

Perhaps in an effort to learn something other than the fact that city-states or small islands without a countryside tend to be very population dense, there has long been a second table for countries with 7.5 million people or more. But is this useful, or even the best option?

Right now the top entries in the main table are all city-states, so somebody might ask "No really bro, what's the most densely population country for real? I think there might not be a real answer, because there's no clear cutoff point where a country starts to look like a "real country". And even if found, that could easily change over time. (Maybe check proportion of rural vs urban land, but that's a lot of work)

I would say the table should be removed, and not replaced. There is already one tool that very quickly tells people what the most populated "large" countries are: the map at the top of the page. Wizmut (talk) 22:59, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

Aland population wrong

Why is Aland shown to have a population of 30, it's actually more than 30,000? 92.19.87.115 (talk) 07:55, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Error on my part, data source was in thousands. Wizmut (talk) 08:46, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Complete update

I have updated the table to include 2023 UN data, and found the most updated sources for other areas, including those that had been excluded in the past. I also replaced the Date column with a more flexible Note column. I changed the Rank column to be more in line with the area and population articles. Wizmut (talk) 01:09, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

@Wizmut: Thanks for the work you have been doing to update this article and remove duplication. I have reverted your change which merged the metric and non-metric columns for area and density respectively. It made the table much harder to scan visually, and broke the concept of data tabulation (one value per cell). I have taken care to preserve any other changes you have made since then. Bazza (talk) 09:43, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
Cheers, thanks for the input Wizmut (talk) 09:46, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Column order

How should the columns in the table be arranged?

Currently, the order shows the calculation used to get to density in a linear way. Population divided by area results in density.

However, when viewing this list on mobile, only the first 2 or 3 columns show up. It may not be possible to show a mobile user everything that they ought to see, but perhaps some columns are more important than others.

I would suggest that the column order should be changed so that density occurs to the left of Area and Population. Wizmut (talk) 16:54, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

I have made this change, along with squishing the 'country' column for readability (this only squishes one territory, far down the list). I also removed the 'notes' column name, because it's not really important to indicate that a note is a note - any reader of a wikipedia article will know what a footnote is when they see one.
I also moved the table title up to be the section title. Wizmut (talk) 22:26, 23 July 2023 (UTC)
I'm not married to any of these changes so if anybody thinks the table could be more legible in any way please say so here. Wizmut (talk) 22:27, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Problem with Cook Islands and Niue

Hello,


Cook Islands and Niue — ranked 115 and 189 respectively — are not countries, though they have been ranked as that. Removing their ranks, however, will be problematic, for the change to all following ranks is necessary.


What can be done?


Thank you. I'm Here to Help You (talk) 01:29, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I can fix them fairly easily, but they do seem to be countries in the same sense that Micronesia and Palau are. With the Realm of New Zealand, they are associated states, not territories.
Is there any way to say definitively that they are not countries? Wizmut (talk) 01:42, 24 July 2023 (UTC)
There is no definitive way. They are not the same as Micronesia and Palau, they are unique, and exist in a grey area. CMD (talk) 02:04, 24 July 2023 (UTC)
As I look into it, the two are accruing recognition over time, but they are still partially recognized. And they are not included in the 'independent' category given by ISO 3166-1. So maybe I'm leaning unranked for Cook and Niue, but would welcome any further points.
Note that it's not too hard to find a point against 'independence' that is not counted against more recognized countries. Using New Zealand dollars is not conclusive, if you consider currencies in the Caribbean and Africa pegged to the USD and Euro, respectively. And abdicating their own defense is not conclusive if you consider Japan or Germany.
I also note that I seem to have ranked Taiwan, which the ISO doesn't declare as independent. It seems that recognition of independence might be hard to come by, no matter how many decades you run your country for. Wizmut (talk) 02:33, 24 July 2023 (UTC)
Partial recognition (and comparison to Taiwan) is an improper framework to assess the CI/Niue. Both are not involved in a sovereignty dispute, instead they have deliberately and uniquely maintained constitutional ties with NZ. There is probably not a right answer as to whether they are numbered or not, it will come down to the numbering criteria chosen. CMD (talk) 02:46, 24 July 2023 (UTC)
The Cook Islands and Niue are both sovereign states recognized by the United Nations and the majority of the international community, including the United States, China, Japan, South Korea, India, the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Spain, Canada, Australia, and Brazil etc.
See articles below for more info:
Political status of the Cook Islands and Niue
List of sovereign states
Member states of the United Nations
Foreign relations of the Cook Islands
Foreign relations of Niue
Constitution of the Cook Islands
Constitution of Niue 2001:8003:900C:5301:80DE:9FBE:80BE:AD01 (talk) 07:45, 27 July 2023 (UTC)
Just wanted to add an astoundingly long talk page article from the sovereign states list. It's over 400k characters and exclusively about CI and N. Wizmut (talk) 09:38, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

Svalbard and Jan Mayen

Are these two territories, or integral parts of Norway? These are exclusive categories.

The ISO 3166-1 lists them as territories, which would indicate that they should be included on this list. However, it does list them together, while Norway does not consider them to be linked in the same way that (for example) the UK considers Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha to be linked.

So I think they warrant inclusion on this list as distinct from Norway proper. Are there any points against this? Wizmut (talk) 18:22, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

@Roy Vinsmoke Kirschtein Your input is requested. Wizmut (talk) 21:48, 24 July 2023 (UTC)
ISO listing in regards to Svalbard and Jan Mayen makes no sense at all, to be honest. Jan Mayen is just a random uninhabited Norwegian island away from the continent. Svalbard is subject to the Svalbard treaties, in which it is recognised that the islands are integral parts of Norway, but they're open for foreign exploitation of its resources.
Not only Svalbard is not a dependent territory, but Svalbard and Jan Mayen have no relation to each other whatsoever. They only thing they have in common is being 2 unincorporated islands that don't belong to any of the counties of the country. But they are administered completely separate from each other. Roy Vinsmoke Kirschtein (talk) 02:18, 25 July 2023 (UTC)
There is nothing special about Jan Mayen, Svalbard is subject to some international agreements but Norway is very firm that it is an integral part of the country. CMD (talk) 01:16, 25 July 2023 (UTC)
Yep, reading a little more it seems the ISO is not respecting Norway's opinion (and laws) in this. Seems like the same category as Hawaii and Guadeloupe.
I might add a note next to Norway specifying what it includes. Does this make the (mainland) entry obsolete? It and the Kingdom of Norway entry are quite similar, maybe not a lot of value in having both now. Wizmut (talk) 01:55, 25 July 2023 (UTC)
Not only Svalbard and Jan Mayen, other territories such as Åland, the Australian external territories, the Caribbean Netherlands, the French overseas regions, and the Special administrative regions of China (Hong Kong and Macao) are also considered integral parts by their respective administering state. Further discussion is needed to come up with an agreed inclusion criteria. Otherwise, we will have this kind of debate forever. 2001:8003:900C:5301:80DE:9FBE:80BE:AD01 (talk) 07:59, 27 July 2023 (UTC)
With some digging I found this talk page. The conversation seemed to favor starting with the ISO and adding partially recognized states. So by that logic subtracting Svalbard would not be done, because subtracting is not allowed.
Not only that, if you look at the archives for Talk:List of sovereign states there are eight archives solely dedicated to discussing what to include on that list. So maybe it's worth it to stick to something flawed but simple. Wizmut (talk) 09:25, 27 July 2023 (UTC)
The inclusion of partially recognized states in such lists is highly controversial. Wikipedia lists 9 partially recognized states, but most sources on the Internet only include 3 partially recognized states:
1. Republic of China (Taiwan)
2. Republic of Kosovo
3. Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (aka Western Sahara)
For most sources, the other 6 "partially recognized states" are basically "renegade provinces". 2001:8003:900C:5301:E4B6:AD71:4DA1:63C1 (talk) 07:21, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

Recent edits without source

@Jamesbound007 your recent edits are very particular, but do not match the values in the source chosen for this article and you have not attached any reason for them in an edit summary. Please clarify on this page what these edits do to improve the article or perhaps what alternative source should be used. If there is no justification provided, your edits will likely be reverted. Wizmut (talk) 10:59, 17 August 2023 (UTC)

Sig figs

I added sources to the tiniest jurisdictions, which can use all the sig figs they can get. On the other hand, I reduced sig figs for Density results that don't actually have pinpoint accuracy. No rankings changed. The exception would have been Tokelau, which I left alone - rounding it off would change its ranking, which is a conundrum somebody else can solve. Wizmut (talk) 01:21, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

Gaza and West Bank

Is it worth adding Gaza and the West Bank in addition to Palestine? Gaza is one of the most densely populated territories on Earth (only slightly less dense than Monaco, at 16,853.1/sq mi, according to their Wikipedia page), and the two Palestinian territories are separately governed. Rxtreme (talk) 19:41, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

They are not dependent territories. Selfstudier (talk) 10:09, 24 August 2023 (UTC)
I agree with Selfstudier that they are not dependencies, however if you meant territory to mean region (as people often do on this topic) then they could conceivably be considered separately. The CIA factbook does treat them as separate[1][2], but the ISO and the UN join them together as "Palestine".[3] Given that this article prefers the ISO source over the CIA one, I think we should stick to not splitting Palestine.
Evidence against would likely come in the form of Gaza or the West Bank declaring themselves as separate from the other, and another country recognizing such a statement. This would make either a partially recognized state. But both governments prefer to call themselves "Palestine". Wizmut (talk) 11:11, 24 August 2023 (UTC)
What is or isn't a country is always a tricky topic around the edges. I would be strongly in favour of just using "common sense", "usefulness", and "facts on the ground" criteria (which tend to be fairly obvious) rather than endless debating the semantics of "country". Western Sahara, Kosovo, Taiwan, and more all are disputed by someone or the other and it's clearly useful to list all of these. The situation with Taiwan isn't all that different by the way.
I wouldn't really overly care, but the differences are huge: West bank: 5,655km2 and 3,188,387 people: 564 per km/2; Gaza: 365 km2 and 2,166,269 people: 5,935 per km2. That's an order of a magnitude difference, and the figure of "892" currently listed for Palestine isn't all that useful to describe either of these two de-facto independent territories.
I got those numbers from this, which is used on e.g. State of Palestine for population figures and can serve as a reference here too. Arp242 (talk) 03:06, 1 November 2023 (UTC)
Would probably take an RfC to get consensus on such a contentious topic (calling Palestine two countries), but your points are all valid as such and could certainly be placed in the note column for Palestine's row. Wizmut (talk) 04:03, 1 November 2023 (UTC)
A number of pages already call Gaza "de facto independent", a "de facto state", "governed independently", and some variants thereof. Does that make it a "country"? Well, it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, so it seems like a duck to me. I just added a note; I feel just adding it to the list would be better but I don't really feel like having long discussions about this – I just came here to look up the population density of Gaza and noticed it wasn't listed and that there was a section about it already. Arp242 (talk) 16:33, 1 November 2023 (UTC)
Since the US and Israel don't accept that State of Palestine is a state, then it is obvious that they would not accept a part of that state to be a state, either. Of course, there are 138 countries that do accept it and it is defined as inclusive of Gaza so opinions about whether it is a duck are irrelevant. Selfstudier (talk) 16:37, 1 November 2023 (UTC)
My point is merely that you can be a "state" for all intents and purposes even though others don't recognize that for political reasons. It's not just me saying that, see e.g. Gaza Strip#Statehood as well as some other pages. Of course the situation in Gaza is unusual, but it seems hard to deny that it's more "state" than "not a state". This is also why this list includes some of the examples I mentioned before (and looking again, also Somaliland, Northern Cyprus, South Ossetia, and perhaps some more): because they're de-facto a separate entity/state, and it's useful to list them. A number of these are not internationally recognized, or only recognized by a very small number of countries, and don't have a ISO-3166 code.
This seems fairly uncontroversial to be honest, except in the case of Palestine because everything surrounding Palestine has to be controversial.
And please don't say people's "opinions are irrelevant". Arp242 (talk) 17:21, 1 November 2023 (UTC)
Oh no, the examples you listed are also controversial. Believe me, I've been there. The only reason I (barely) favor a stricter approach is because it comports with previous consensus and makes deciding these things much easier.
A sweeping consensus from 2009[4] held that country lists should be based on the ISO 3166-1 standard, except to also include partially recognized states. To be a partially recognized state, one has to first declare oneself a state, and have another state sign off on that fact. But Gaza and the West Bank don't call themselves independent of one another. So even though there's two ducks, they identify as the same duck. Wizmut (talk) 17:33, 1 November 2023 (UTC)
A number of these are not internationally recognized, or only recognized by a very small number of countries, and don't have a ISO-3166 code See List of states with limited recognition Selfstudier (talk) 18:02, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

Slovakia

Population is 5 449 270, see https://sk.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slovensko 91.219.132.21 (talk) 09:06, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

This article uses data from the United Nations unless otherwise specified. Wizmut (talk) 20:33, 22 November 2023 (UTC)

Static row numbers vs previous consensus

In country lists, the consensus has been to not rank territories or partially recognized states - only UN-recognized states are ranked.[5] This consensus applies to any country list which uses multiple sources. @Timeshifter

The rank column is also usually sortable. More history here: [6] Wizmut (talk) 12:15, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

Hi. I don't see consensus to have any numbering. I see: "By one !vote there is consensus to remove the numbering." One vote is not much of a consensus to remove it or keep it.
I edit a lot of country lists. I wrote large parts of Help:Table.
This list was messed up in so many ways. It was using a deprecated template. The numbering was inaccurate and out of date. This is common with manually maintained numbering. Most country lists nowadays have moved over to Template:Static row numbers. It requires no maintenance. --Timeshifter (talk) 12:28, 26 November 2023 (UTC)
The RfC summary was a little misleading because, of course, RfC's don't come down to votes (or they're not supposed to, anyways). The sum of the conversation was a compromise. Some wanted the ranks removed. Some wanted the territories not listed at all. Those that could put up with listing the territories still wanted the ranking of countries to be easy to discover. For example, what is the least populous country (not territory or partially recognized country)?
This table mostly uses UN data with some filler for gaps in their data, so it only needs to be updated once a year. This can be achieved in Excel, making the distinction between ranked and unranked regions easy and automatic.
I too would like these tables to be simpler, but after reading through all the points people make, not to mention the amount of discussion that even small points can generate and regenerate, I've come to favor relying on these consensus solutions. Wizmut (talk) 12:36, 26 November 2023 (UTC)
There is a lot of wishful thinking in some list discussions. A big one being that a complicated list will continue to be maintained. They often aren't. Simpler is better.
Let's try this for awhile. --Timeshifter (talk) 12:46, 26 November 2023 (UTC)
Is there a way to deprive a given row of a rank? Some rows are neither countries nor territories, like "World (all land)". And there's two entries for France, pushing down all the others.
The ranking for countries is a real data point that's being changed to fit the template. Wizmut (talk) 21:36, 26 November 2023 (UTC)
See Template:Static row numbers for options at the top. And: Template:Static row numbers#No number on specific rows. --Timeshifter (talk) 23:26, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

Maybe add a year column

See example: List of countries by intentional homicide rate. --Timeshifter (talk) 16:43, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps the note column could mention when the data points are not from the most current UN year. A lot of these are the microstates that need non-UN sources to get more than one sig fig for area.
Sometimes people change the data source so it's non-UN data, but I've decided not to police that, because it'll be removed each July when the entire table is refreshed. Wizmut (talk) 19:33, 30 November 2023 (UTC)
The article says: "Unless otherwise noted, areas and populations are sourced from the United Nations World Population Prospects, which uses the latest censuses and official figures, as well as figures from the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs."
Please mention the years for the populations from each source. Areas don't change much. If it is the same year for almost everything, say this year just above the table. And I suggest creating a separate year column for any years differing from that. Only put in years that are different. References might be added to that column just for those years that are different. Or create a separate Refs column for that. --Timeshifter (talk) 23:31, 30 November 2023 (UTC)
Per your suggestion, I have added notes about the data points which deviate from the default year. But I think repeating these oddities in a column would result in a lot of empty space. Wizmut (talk) 00:17, 1 December 2023 (UTC)
I don't see 2023 mentioned in any of the sources. Where is this from?:
https://unstats.un.org/unsd/demographic-social/products/dyb/documents/dyb2021/table03.pdf
I mean what is the path to get there?
WP:V requires that info. Please put that path in the reference.
--Timeshifter (talk) 00:42, 1 December 2023 (UTC)
Thank you, I had forgotten that the UN site was counter-intuitive to navigate.
I decided to not link directly to the Data Portal app, but instead to the landing page beforehand. This is for two reasons: in the past, they have changed the link to their app, but not the landing page; and the app is choppy to load, but the landing page is not. Wizmut (talk) 00:52, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Don't be afraid of long references. They satisfy WP:V much better. And people appreciate them. Especially editors who may want to help out. See examples here:

--Timeshifter (talk) 01:08, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Maybe alphabetize the list. Easier to maintain

And with static row numbers one can use the sort button to see a ranked list for any column. See example:

To alphabetize the list quickly:

Once alphabetized it is easy to update the table. Anyone can update a few or many countries. And no moving around countries in the wikitext is ever required again. --Timeshifter (talk) 16:54, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

This table has always used UN data except for the few non ISO-3166 entries. Similar to List of countries by population (United Nations). This means one update a year, really.
There are advantages to being able to see the most densely population places without having to know how to sort wikitables. Wizmut (talk) 19:36, 30 November 2023 (UTC)
There are very few people left on the web who don't know how to click a sorting button on a table. They are common across the web.
I guess it depends on how often individual locations are updated in between yearly updates. And if there is someone around to fix the order in the wikitext if necessary. --Timeshifter (talk) 23:38, 30 November 2023 (UTC)
You'd be surprised what people don't know. And it seems like putting the needs of editors ahead of the users. Talking about the cases of the very few, there aren't many editors who don't know how to cut and paste, especially among page watchers.
Country lists of different topics have different editors, but all of the most prominent ones sort by their topic, not alphabetically. A broad consensus. Wizmut (talk) 23:48, 30 November 2023 (UTC)
Many people don't know about the existence of Template:Static row numbers.
Some people may want to see ranking by population, and not just density. Can't do that with a row number column that is not static. --Timeshifter (talk) 00:00, 1 December 2023 (UTC)
If they want to see the ranking of countries by population then they should head to List of countries and dependencies by population and/or List of countries by population (United Nations). And it seems that they already are, as the main population article is viewed three times as much as this density one.
The only reason the population and area are included is because there's room and readers are likely to be curious about the data the density is derived from. But they're here for density, and more than that, density extremes. Wizmut (talk) 00:12, 1 December 2023 (UTC)
Slipped my mind that we now use Template:Static row numbers here. So it is possible to rank any column now. So it is OK to start with one column in rank order, as long as it is maintainable. A list that is mainly updated once a year makes that more possible. Though the editors that do that maintenance sometimes leave Wikipedia for awhile. Then the list can become a mess if editors only update individual countries, but not their order in the list. --Timeshifter (talk) 01:13, 1 December 2023 (UTC)
  1. ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_countries_and_dependencies_by_population_density&action=history&dir=prev&offset=20200204123213%7C939113120&limit=500
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