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A geometry created in Earth Engine is either geodesic (i.e. edges are the shortest path
on the surface of a sphere) or planar (i.e. edges are the shortest path in a 2-D Cartesian
plane). No one planar coordinate system is suitable for global collections of features,
so Earth Engine's geometry constructors build geodesic geometries by default. To make a
planar geometry, constructors have a geodesic parameter that can be set
to false:
[null,null,["Last updated 2023-10-06 UTC."],[[["\u003cp\u003eEarth Engine geometries are geodesic by default, meaning edges follow the Earth's curvature for shortest distance.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003ePlanar geometries can be created by setting the \u003ccode\u003egeodesic\u003c/code\u003e parameter to \u003ccode\u003efalse\u003c/code\u003e, resulting in straight-line edges in a 2D plane.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe \u003ccode\u003eee.Geometry\u003c/code\u003e constructor allows for conversion between geodesic and planar representations.\u003c/p\u003e\n"]]],["Earth Engine geometry can be geodesic (shortest path on a sphere) or planar (shortest path on a 2D plane). Geodesic is the default for global collections. To create a planar geometry, set the `geodesic` parameter to `false` in the `ee.Geometry` constructor, as shown in the code example: `var planarPolygon = ee.Geometry(polygon, null, false);`. Conversion between these types is possible using the same constructor. Figure 1 illustrates the visual difference between geodesic (red) and planar (black) polygons.\n"],null,["# Geodesic vs. Planar Geometries\n\nA geometry created in Earth Engine is either geodesic (i.e. edges are the shortest path\non the surface of a sphere) or planar (i.e. edges are the shortest path in a 2-D Cartesian\nplane). No one planar coordinate system is suitable for global collections of features,\nso Earth Engine's geometry constructors build geodesic geometries by default. To make a\nplanar geometry, constructors have a `geodesic` parameter that can be set\nto **false**:\n\n### Code Editor (JavaScript)\n\n```javascript\nvar planarPolygon = ee.Geometry(polygon, null, false);\n```\n\nFigure 1 shows the difference between the default geodesic polygon and the result of\nconverting the polygon to a planar representation.\nFigure 1. A geodesic polygon (red) and a planar polygon (black).\n\nYou can convert between geodesic and planar geometries using the `ee.Geometry`\nconstructor."]]
