THIS WOULD HAVE TO BE A CONTEST between the eastern gorilla, an extinct relative of the orangutans from China, and Jon Brower Minnoch, a taxi driver from Washington state, USA, who died in 1983.
There are 28 living species of ape: chimpanzee, bonobo, human, two species of gorilla, three species of orangutan and 20 species of gibbon. A typical eastern gorilla is not quite as tall as the average human, but it’s significantly heavier, and outweighs all the others, too. We tend to attach more importance to weight than height when gauging the overall size of an animal. (The elephant, not the giraffe, is regarded as the biggest land animal, for example.) So it is probably safe to say that the eastern gorilla is the biggest living ape species.
Or…