Theory: The Avatar world is tiny, smaller than Pluto
This is a write-up estimating the size of the Avatar world as well as its population in ATLA and TLOK .
How come Korra only used a speedboat without supplies to go to the Fire Nation? How come Tonraq reached the South Pole from the North Pole using only a small. Here’s the answer.
Let’s start with land area.
Katara and Zuko traveled to Whaletail Island in Southern Raiders from a beach camp near the Western Air Temple. They left at the morning and arrived there during the night. They were able to go back to the Fire Nation the next day and returned to their camp by sunset.
Edit: They left at midnight, visited an outpost before dawn and arrived 8:00PM there’s probably at least 12 hours worth of travel. Take note Appa collapsed in The Chase after nonstop flying so he needs rest time.
How fast is Appa? The first hint is that Appa can fly faster than a Fire Nation airship. The first airships in history are only 9km/h while the Zeppelins in the 1900’s run at 84 km/h at top speed. I doubt Appa flies that fast all the time though so let’s pin the average at 50 km/hr assuming Zuko and Katara are in a hurry. Appa’s relaxed speed is most likely slower at average wind speed 10kph.
20 hours x 50kph = 1000 km 20 hours x 10 kph = 200 km So average distance is 600 km with the assumption that it’s a 12 hour ride. (See Avatar forums: Theory Avatar world and population to see my discussion why this is a fairly accurate estimate.)
If the distance from their camp to Whaletail Island is roughly ⅓ of the map. The visible world of Avatar (only half of the globe) is roughly 1800km across, let’s also assume it’s the distance from the top of the map to the bottom.
The Avatar world has a 3600km equatorial circumference = Roughly the size of Pluto’s moon Charon (3700 km equatorial circumference)
Rough estimate of Avatar map area = 1800km x 1800 km = 3,240,000 km square
If half of this area is water = 1,620,000 kmsq land area
Judging from the map, the Fire Nation, poles and the Air Nomad Territories seem to be roughly equal but even if you combine them all they are still smaller than the Earth Kingdom.
So we’ll work on this land area assumption:
70% Earth Kingdom = 1,134,000 kmsq
(10% Fire Nation + 10% Air Nomad Territory +10% North and South poles) = total 486, 000 kmsq
So probably he’s the relative size compared to our world:
Main hint: According to Master Piandao, there is probably a million people with the name of Lee/Li
According to my research there’s a high chance that the most popular name in our world is Muhammad with an estimated 150 million men and boys with that name.
With 7 billion people = 2% of the population is named Muhammad
So if there’s 1 million Lee/Li and they are 2% of the population, then there are roughly 50 million people in ATLA.
ATLA population estimates:
Earth Kingdom = 35,000,000 (assumption that they take up 70% of the population as they take the same proportion of land area)
Air Nomad Territory = One (decimated)
NWT = 50,000*- 1 million (maximum is the typical population sizes of big cities in the 1800’s)
*There’s no indicated minimum city size but the ancient city of Uruk is estimated to have 50,000 residents so we’ll use it as a minimum NWT city population.
It’s a bit tricky to estimate the exact population in LoK since each nation has a different doubling time. For example, at its current population growth, China will need 70 years to double its population while Afghanistan would only need 25 years. Peacetime after war typically result to a baby boom generation and early marriages (like Aang and Katara LOL). Let’s assume the population growth rate post-war is 1.43 for 10 years (Post WWII USA growth rate) , with a 5% increase in the first year, and for 60 years population grew at 1.1% annually (world average).
(50,000,000 + 5% growth rate post-war x 1.43% growth rate in the USA baby boom decade x 1.1% average world growth rate) = Population in Legend of Korra
((((50,000,000*(1.05))*1.043^9))*1.011^60)= Around 147,838,454 people in LoK
Population in LoK estimates:
Earth Kingdom = at least 103,486,917 (70%)
Fire Nation= at least 28,000,000, could be up to 45 million
Air Nomads/Nation = At least 5 airbenders, unknown number of acolytes
NWT= 100,000- 3 million (it has settlements outside the city and barbarians)
SWT = at least 50k, most likely fueled by migration from NWT (according to the world view in Light in the Dark there are two major settlements)
Republic City - Now this is a bit trickier, but let’s give it the high estimate for NWT which is 3 million. Hong Kong is less than a million people in the 1920’s but since RC is not just one big city let’s assume it’s more populous than the NWT.
Ba Sing Se’s population is at least 2 million people if we use the proportion of the population of Shanghai(most populated city) to China’s total.
So that’s my theory, please share your thoughts about it!