China grew 63.5 million tonnes of watermelon in 2024, just over 60% of all the watermelon grown in the world. India came second with 3.7 million tonnes, about a seventeenth of China’s.
More than everyone else put together
The whole world grew about 105 million tonnes of watermelon in 2024. Take China out and every other country put together comes to about 41 million tonnes, so China on its own out-grew the rest of the planet by about 22 million tonnes.
That’s why the map only needs two colours. Every country that isn’t China grew 3.7 million tonnes or less, and is on the map mostly for scale.
The rest of the top 10
After China and India came Turkey, Algeria, Brazil, Russia, Uzbekistan, the United States, Senegal and Iran.
Spain came 13th and Italy 18th. The UK didn’t make the top 20, which will surprise nobody who has spent a summer in the UK.
How the numbers are counted
All of these figures come from the FAO, the UN’s food and farming agency, which records how much of each crop every country grows each year. Somebody there knows exactly how much watermelon Uzbekistan grew in 2024 (1,730,817 tonnes), and now so do you.
But why, I hear you ask?
Mostly because China eats it. Food Republic puts it at about 16 billion watermelons a year, around 100 pounds per person and about 70% of all the watermelon eaten in the world. China also has a lot of farmland and a lot of different weather, from hot, dry Gansu to Xinjiang, where hot days and cool nights grow particularly sweet melons. It’s a summer snack, a festival gift and, in Beijing, a jelly called xī guā lào, and a frugal tradition means the rind gets eaten too. Nobody else stands a chance.
More food maps: each US state’s official drink and where each country thinks the turkey is from.
Sources: AtlasBig, watermelon production by country (FAOSTAT, 2024). Why China eats so much: Food Republic.
| Country | Tonnes |
|---|---|
 1. China | 63,510,422 |
 2. India | 3,721,254 |
 3. Turkey | 3,198,000 |
 4. Algeria | 2,520,724 |
 5. Brazil | 1,978,702 |
See all 10 countries
 6. Russia | 1,935,891 |
 7. Uzbekistan | 1,730,817 |
 8. United States | 1,677,612 |
 9. Senegal | 1,362,440 |
 10. Iran | 1,280,722 |
Share this map
More from Terrible Maps
The bookTerrible Maps: Hilarious Maps for a Ridiculous WorldOut now in the UK, US, Canada and Australia.
The shopShirts, hoodies, mugs and printsIncluding the Africa / Asia T-shirt.There’s a new terrible map most days on Facebook and Instagram.
