Why Russia Is So Big (and Still So Empty)

Russia is the largest country on Earth, bigger than the whole surface of Pluto, yet it has fewer people than Bangladesh, and three out of four Russians live in its western corner. How did it get so big, and why is it still so empty? In this video: the cold and the permafrost that cover most of Siberia, rivers that flow the wrong way, how a band of Cossacks and the fur trade carried Moscow's power to the Pacific in about sixty years, why Russia sold Alaska, the Trans-Siberian Railway, and why the Russian Far East keeps losing people today. 0:00 The biggest, emptiest country 0:36 The biggest country on Earth 2:24 Where Russians actually live 4:08 Why Siberia is so hard to live in 6:51 How Moscow conquered a continent 9:33 Why Russia never stopped growing 11:48 The railway that tried to fill Siberia 14:16 Why the Far East keeps emptying 15:54 The answer Subscribe for a new map story every week 👉 @TimelineEarth