What would America look like
if every state had the same population?
Redraw the country into 50 regions containing roughly the same number of people.
Equal population produces radically unequal-looking regions.
Dense corridors fracture into small pieces while sparsely populated areas combine into enormous ones. The faint dark lines show the real state borders.
Alaska is part of Region 1; Hawaii is part of Region 7. Each label marks the largest 2023 incorporated place in that region.
How were these regions created?
U.S. counties were grouped into 50 geographically coherent regions containing roughly equal populations, using U.S. Census Bureau Vintage 2023 county estimates. Connecticut uses 2020 census counties. Mainland regions are contiguous; Alaska and Hawaii are assigned to Pacific regions, and island counties may appear detached.
The method recursively divides counties by population and geography, then refines the result with border-county swaps. Whole counties are preserved, so perfect equality is not always possible. Los Angeles County alone exceeds the target population for one region and is not divided.
These are illustrative Hanten regions, not proposed states or official boundaries.
What changes when we compare places by people instead of land?