Saudi Arabia is the biggest thing on the Arabian Peninsula, so most players start it confidently and then draw a featureless brick. The marks come from the edges: a Red Sea coast that curves, a Gulf coast that doesn't, and one corner where Qatar pokes into the shoreline.
The shape at a glance
The kingdom is a big tilted slab, clearly wider than tall, occupying most of the Arabian Peninsula. The west side is a long, gently curving Red Sea coastline; the north and southwest are mostly straight surveyed borders through desert; the east is a short, flat Persian Gulf shore. The bottom is a broad empty sweep — the Rub' al Khali — ending where Yemen and Oman begin.
Step by step
- Block in a wide rectangle tilted slightly so the top edge runs from upper-left down to the right, about one and a half times wider than tall.
- Draw the west edge as a long, smooth S-curve — this is the Red Sea coast, bowing outward toward Africa.
- Run the top edge in two diagonal straight lines: down-right along Jordan, then across Iraq to the corner at Kuwait.
- Drop the short east coast down the Persian Gulf, and carve the small inward notch where Qatar's peninsula interrupts the shoreline.
- Sweep the bottom as one long soft arc, the Empty Quarter, rising at the far right where it meets Oman.
- Pull the southeast corner into a long straight diagonal up toward the Gulf — the Oman border — so the bottom-right is a clean wedge, not a rounded blob.
Mistakes that cost you points
- Drawing it as a plain rectangle and losing the Red Sea coast's outward bow.
- Giving the east coast a long dramatic shoreline when the Persian Gulf side is actually short and flat.
- Forgetting the Qatar notch, which leaves the Gulf coast suspiciously smooth.
- Making the southern border wiggly — the Empty Quarter edges are famously straight lines on a map.
Place it on the map
Saudi Arabia fills the space between the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf, with Jordan and Iraq stacked along its top and Yemen and Oman capping the bottom. Place Egypt across the Red Sea to the west and Iran across the Gulf to the east, and the slab between them is Saudi.
Pro tip: Think 'soft left, hard right': put all your wiggles into the Red Sea coast and keep every land border ruler-straight. IoU scoring loves that contrast because the straight edges cover a huge amount of area cheaply.
Frequently Asked Questions
- How do you draw Saudi Arabia from memory?
- Start with the overall box — is Saudi Arabia wider than tall or the reverse — then place its signature feature first and build the rest of the outline around it. Finish with the coastline details, then compare against the real border in a free practice round to get a 0-100 score.
- How hard is it to draw Saudi Arabia?
- Saudi Arabia rates as medium difficulty. The overall box is easy, but the Red Sea coast's kinks and the straight desert borders need to stay distinct.