On a Mercator projection the sizes of landmass near north and south poles are greatly exaggerated in what?

On a Mercator projection, landmasses near the North and South Poles appear significantly larger than they actually are due to the way the map distorts size and shape to maintain straight lines for navigation. This distortion occurs because the projection stretches the poles to fit the rectangular format, leading to an overrepresentation of areas like Greenland and Antarctica. As a result, while the equatorial regions are depicted more accurately, polar regions are exaggerated, misleading viewers about their true scale.