While most people on the surface of the Earth have learned that Mt. Everest is the highest land form, a recent story from the Business Insider reveals that it is not actually the tallest mountain on the living planet.

According to the report, Mt. Everest is not the tallest mountain around the globe, technically-speaking, and it all boils down to the actual height of the mountain and where you measured.

The Guinness World Records deemed Mt. Everest as the "highest mountain" around the world with its peak reaching as high as 8,848 meters or 29,028 feet 9 inches but they do not consider it as the "tallest" around the world.

In fact, the Guinness World Records declared that the tallest mountain in the planet is Hawaii's Mauna Kea, which has an actual height of a staggering 10,205 meters or approximately 33,480 feet if you measure its entirety from its base at the bottom of the sea.

The difference, as explained by KnowledgeNuts.com, is that the "highest" peak is gauged from the surface of the sea while "tallest" is measured from the base to the peak of the entire mountain even if the former is under the sea.

After considering this fact, anyone can safely claim that Mt. Everest is not the tallest since Mauna Kea, located in the island of Hawaii, is nearly a mile taller.

Mauna Kea, according to the Business Insider, is an inactive volcano about a million years old. Its height above sea level is only at 13,796 feet because the entire 19,700 feet is submerged under water.

It is located along the Kohala coast on the northern part of Hawaii and is situated atop a tectonic plate—the very same one that paved the way to its existence according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Its last eruption happened some 4,600 years ago.

While it has been inactive for a very long time, there is still a possibility that Mauna Kea would erupt since it is considered "dormant" and not an "extinct" volcano, according to the website Explore the Big Island.

Like other volcanoes in Hawaii, the tallest peak on Earth is considered a shield volcano, the kind that extensively stretches in width and has broad but gently sloping sides. This shape is all thanks to the lava that gently flowed on the surface of the volcano, leaving it smooth after the hot fluid hardened.

Since it has erupted numerous times in the past, layers of broad sheets of hardened lava made Mauna Kea the tallest peak all over the world.