Countries export a wide range of things, from consumer products, to raw materials, to energy resources. Generally speaking, the largest industrialized nations export the most, while smaller nations and less developed nations export relatively very little. Additionally, most countries try to find a balance between their exports and their imports, so when countries export a great deal, they also tend to import a great deal as well.

The easiest way to measure which countries export the most is simply to look at the total value of their combined exports. The total value of all exports in the world in 2008 was roughly $16.34 trillion US Dollars (USD), which is essentially equal to the combined imports of $16.21 trillion USD. Of this, Germany exports the most, with a combined export value of roughly $1.53 trillion USD. China comes next, with a combined export value of $1.465 trillion USD. The United States comes in third, exporting $1.377 trillion USD. These top three countries export $4.372 trillion USD worth of goods, or a bit more than a quarter of the world’s entire export value.

These numbers are especially interesting when compared to the total value of these nations’ imports. The United States is the largest importer in terms of value, with total imports of around $2.19 trillion USD. Germany follows, with imports of $1.202 trillion USD. And China comes in third, with imports worth $1.156 trillion USD. This means these three countries import roughly $4.548 trillion USD worth of goods, just about equal to their total exports, but with a disproportionate amount carried by the United States.

The other top ten exporting countries are Japan with $776.8 billion USD, France with $629.7 billion USD, Italy with $566.1 billion USD, the Netherlands with $537.5 billion USD, Russia with $476 billion USD, the United Kingdom with $468.7 billion USD, and Canada with $461.8 billion USD. These other seven countries have combined exports worth around $3.9166 trillion USD, still quite a bit less than the total of the top three. This also means that the top ten exporting countries export around $8.2886 trillion USD, or more than half of the world’s total exports. The top ten importing countries are very similar, with France, Japan, the United Kingdom, Italy, and the Netherlands all appearing on both lists, and with both South Korea and Spain beating out Canada and Russia as major importers.

The amount that these top nations export is even more staggering when compared to the nations at the bottom of the list. Countries like Tuvalu and Naura, for example, which are small island nations with low population, export less than 1/100th of 1% of what a nation like the United States exports. Nauru, for example, has total exports of only $64,000 USD. Even fairly large nations may have almost no exports, if their economies are impoverished enough. Rwanda, for example, had exports in 2008 of only $219 million USD, or around 1/2000th the exports of a country like Canada.

How much countries export can also be looked at in terms of per capita exports, which helps to balance out the differences in population. Germany, for example, exports $1.53 trillion USD, and has a population of around 82 million people, making for per capita exports of around $18,650 USD. China, on the other hand, exports $1.465 trillion USD worth of goods, but has a population of 1.33 billion people, making for per-capita exports of only $1,100 USD. And the United States has exports valued at $1.377 trillion USD, and a population of around 303 million people, making for per capita exports of around $4,545 USD.