Misleading Package Size

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    Normally, due to people not wanting to waste too much material, packages tend to be about the same size as what's in them. Not when this tropes comes up. In that case, an entire wooden box used for major transport could be used to carry a single pen, a steel suitcase the size of a rifle is used to transport a single ammo clip, etc. Tends to be parodied in cartoons, when they somehow pull a giant 30+ Inch TV out of a package the size of a shoebox, in which case it can overlap with Hammerspace.

    Compare Bigger on the Inside. Sometimes combined with Hollywood Giftwrap. Has nothing to do with Bigger Is Better in Bed. Or Gag Penis.

    Examples of Misleading Package Size include:

    Bigger case examples

    Video Games

    • In a lot of FPS games, you can find a single ammo clip in boxes large enough to hold a large rifle.

    Western Animation

    • In King of the Hill, Luanne gives Hank a shoebox gift, but turns to contain only a tiny gift box containing a pass to swim with the resort's dolphin.
    • Taz-Mania: In "Sub Commander Taz", he ordered a nuclear submarine from a comic-book ad. It was delivered in a crate that filled most of the room, but it turned out to be a toy so small it could be dropped into a water glass.

    Real Life

    An early computer memory chip (Intel 1702A). The actual circuit is just the tiny square behind the window.
    • Tends to be used by children when they need to make a surprise, in order to make the other child think they got a huge gift. Alternatively, they just got lazy/bored and put a small box in a shoebox.
    • A lot of companies do this out of either false advertising (Make the buyer think there is more in the package than there actually is) or just plain standard package sizes.
      • This is a common problem with food packaging; there are supposedly legal limits to the use of "headroom" for packages like cereal boxes, but loopholes let manufacturers continue to get away with a little more if they hide behind "contents may settle during handling" or other spurious disclaimers.
      • Another food package which is prone to misuse is the air-tight plastic bag which has been "inflated" during the packaging process. Half a bag of crisps, half a bag of air. The factory insists that it needs to be air-tight to keep the product fresh, but the end result is that it becomes more difficult to estimate how many chips/crisps or candy pieces are actually in the bag.
    • Things packaged for shipping often have much bigger boxes then the item itself. Justified, because they fill the space in with bubble wrap and shipping peanuts to prevent damage.
    • Sometimes Truth in Television. These days security precautions package seemingly rudimentary things with too much tape, foam, bubble wrap, more tape, a box inside of a box, and more tape, to make it look comically unnecessary.
    • Consumer Reports magazine has a regular feature on its back page showing off various advertising bloopers submitted by readers. Items where the package size is (misleadingly) larger than its actual contents get labelled with the "Black Hole Award".
    • When CDs were first sold they came in boxes 3-4 times bigger than the disk. This was meant to help prevent shoplifting.
      • This one has been zigzagging, with "normal" CD cases (5mm thick with often a booklet), shrinking to thin CD cases (half the thickness, never a booklet), and growing back to DVD cases (width, height, and half the thickness of a VHS).
    • Integrated circuit "chips" are often manufactured in multiple forms where two or three different versions of the part have the same circuitry inside, but are widely different in physical size. This usually includes one or two tiny form factors (some version of surface-mount or ball-grid array) intended for products assembled by automated machines, and a larger version of the same part (sometimes with the connections all spaced 1/10th or 1/20th of an inch apart) which is large enough to be soldered to a circuit board by hand. This "package" is a permanent part of the component.
      • These parts are then subject to further packaging into reels, tubes, trays, boxes for distribution – with that intermediate packaging discarded when the chips are soldered to the board.
      • That plastic anti-static tube full of small computer chips will then be placed in a small antistatic bag or two, then placed into padding or bubble wrap for shipping, then placed into a cardboard box... largely for protection from static electricity or mechanical damage, but even the tiniest speck of a component attracts many times its own weight in packaging material. Order one resistor (which in surface-mount is commonly 0.080" x 0.050" or smaller) and see how much extra packaging is placed around it before the part actually gets shipped. :)
    • Some parents will often package something small in a much larger box during a gift-giving holiday to tease them.
      • This makes sense if the form factor would otherwise make the contents obvious... such as a printed book, a vinyl LP or an audio/video cassette. A gift wrapping which follows exactly the outline of a distinctive object (be it a violin or an iron anvil) might be amusing for fictional dramatic purposes, but would be a dead giveaway of the contents in real life.

    Smaller case or misleading shape examples

    Advertising

    • A commercial once had a woman unwrap a package the shape of a tennis racket to reveal an armchair inside.

    Anime and Manga

    • Dragon Ball: anything from the Capsule Corporation (vehicles, appliances, houses, ect.) collapses down for storage in a capsule no bigger than a person's finger.

    Live Action TV

    Western Animation

    • There's a Donald Duck cartoon in which he's a gift wrapper in a department store. He puts a small ring inside a large box, then tries to put a football in the box meant for the ring. He has to deflate the ball in order to fit it in.
    • In the recent Disney short "How to Hook Up Your Home Theater", Goofy is having trouble opening a small package of cables. After failing to open it, a single drop of sweat causes the package to burst open, covering Goofy in about half a metric ton of cables.
    • In the SpongeBob SquarePants episode "The Idiot Box", SpongeBob buys a television set just to play with the box it came in. The TV was about three times the size of the box.
    • Family Guy: Brian once received a Christmas present shaped like a wine bottle. He removed the wrapping paper to discover a book.
    • In the Classic Disney Short "Pluto's Party", Pluto gets a present shaped like a huge bone, but when he bites into it, it turns out to be a wagon.
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