Although about 70 percent of Earth’s surface is currently covered in water, new research suggests ancient Earth might not have had any land at all. NASA Earth Observatory. New research suggests ancient Earth was a water world, with little to no land in sight. And that could have major implications for the origin and evolution of life. While modern Earth’s surface is about 70 percent water-covered, the new research indicates that our planet was a true ocean world some 3 billion years ago. At this point, only scattered archipelagos breached our global ocean’s briny surface.