Labs / History
Out of Africa
A single population leaves the East African Rift and spreads across the whole planet. Press play, or scrub the timeline to any moment in the last 100,000 years, then click anywhere on the map to ask when the wavefront first arrived. The Bering land bridge only lets people into the Americas while ice-age seas are low — so try raising the sea level and watch continents stay empty.
100,000 BPland 0 %site click the map
What to try
- Click Australia and then the tip of South America — which one did people reach first, and by how many thousand years?
- Slide the sea level up toward 0 m so the Bering bridge never opens. Do the Americas ever get settled at all?
- If our ancestors had walked twice as fast, would the world fill in half the time — or do the bridges still hold them back?
- Why does Australia get people while the sea is high, but the Americas need the water to drop first?
- Why does southern South America turn out to be the very last place settled, even though it is not the farthest point from Africa in a straight line?