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India is the fourth seventh biggest country on Earth, while Ganymede is the largest moon in our Solar System therefore, there isn’t much comparison when comparing the sizes between the two. Ganymede has a surface area of 87.2 million sq. km whilst India’s is far lesser at 3.28 million sq. km. In regards to volume, India’s is 154.5 million cubic km whereas Ganymede’s is 76.6 billion cubic km.
For a more detailed look each body and what makes them as big as they are as a whole, continue reaidng as it will be discussed in more detail below.
How Big Is India?
India is a South Asian country, which is the seventh largest by area and second most populated in the world (with over 1.3 billion people). In addition, it is the most populous democracy in the world. The Indian Ocean bounds it to the south, while the Arabian Sea covers the southwest, and the Bay of Bengal borders the southeast.
The diameter of India, measuring east to west, is 2,933km, while the extreme latitudes of north and south cover a length of 3,214km. Either way, it is smaller than the Mars’ diameter. India’s coastline stretches over 7,000km, meaning that much of India’s landmass protrudes into the Indian ocean.
India’s total surface area is 3,287,590 sq. km and covers a diverse range of landscapes, from dry stretches of desert to snow-covered mountain peaks. Most of the central, northern, and eastern regions of India encompass the fertile lands of the Indo-Gangetic plain, while the sandy and rocky landscape of the Thar Desert occupy the west.
This fertile area – sometimes referred to as the Ganges plain – covers a large amount of India’s north and is created by soil deposits from the rivers that run from the vast Himalayan mountains. In some areas, the depth of this silt can be greater than 25,000ft!
The highest point is India is undefined because of a territorial dispute with Pakistan. The highest point within this territory (known as Kashmir) is K2, which stands at 8,611m. However, the highest point in India’s undisputed territory is Kanchenjunga which reaches a height of 8,598m.
Average crustal thickness varies between regions, ranging from 30-35 km in the plains to 80 km in the mountainous areas. Calculating the mean thickness among all these variations totals roughly 47km. If we then multiply this by the surface area, we can calculate the estimated volume of India to be 154,516,730 cubic km.
How Big Is Ganymede?
Ganymede is the largest moon of Jupiter and the largest object in our solar system not to be properly classified as a planet. It is the only moon with a magnetic field of its own, and one of the few bodies in our solar system known to possess a magnetosphere.
Ganymede has a diameter of 5,262 km and a surface area of 87,200,000 sq. km. Its diameter is much larger than India’s, but its surface area is far vaster because the moon is spherical rather than flat. This gives it an impressive volume of 76,600,000,000 cubic km.
This moon is a source of fascination for scientists, with Hubble observations suggesting it may possess an underground ocean. Potentially, this ocean could contain more water than all the water on Earth combined with a depth of up to 100 km – ten times deeper than the oceans on Earth. This ocean is buried beneath a 150 km ice crust.
The terrain of Ganymede falls into two distinct categories: large, bright ridged regions and older, darker ground. This terrain pattern suggests the moon could have been under significant tension from global tectonic processes.
Galileo Galilei first discovered the moon in January 1610; significant because it was the first time scientists observed an object orbiting a planet other than Earth. And this helped us recognize that the Sun lies at the center of our Universe rather than the Earth.
Ganymede formed from leftover gas and dust that remained after Jupiter’s formation, which means that it is roughly the same age as our solar system – 4.5 billion years old.
Three main layers comprise Ganymede; a metallic core, a surrounding mantle of rock, and a top layer of ice. Computer models simulating Ganymede’s makeup show that more ice and oceans could be sandwiched between these main layers. The Hubble Space Telescope also discovered that the moon might have a thin atmosphere of oxygen.
Ganymede is the seventh moon from Jupiter, which orbits at around 1.070 million kilometers away from its planet. This means that Ganymede takes roughly seven Earth days to orbit its planet. While Ganymede is vast – larger than the planet Mercury – it only possesses half the mass of our closest planet to the Sun, classifying it as a low-density object.
Summary
As Ganymede is the biggest moon in our solar system and has a surface area that is around 26 times bigger than India’s and a volume roughly 500 times India’s.
As a result of its spherical nature, Ganymede is leaps and bound bigger than India, which only makes sense because even as a moon it is larger than Mercury, which as we know is an officially recognised planet.