Key facts
- Category
- Stars
- Object class
- G-type main-sequence star
- Mass
- ~333,000 Earth masses
- Temperature
- 5,772 K surface
- Scale fact
- 1.39 million kmdiameter
- Estimated age
- ~4.6 billion years
- Composition
- Hydrogen and helium
Sun
1.39 million kmdiameter
Visual creditSolar Dynamics Observatory 2024 / NASA / SDO / HMI science team / Public domainSource: Wikimedia Commons
Details
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System and the source of almost all the energy reaching its planets. It fuses about 600 million metric tons of hydrogen each second, and energy released in the core takes on the order of 100,000 years to work its way out to the visible surface.
The Sun is a self-gravitating sphere of plasma containing more than 99.8% of the Solar System’s mass. Fusion in its core converts about 600 million metric tons of hydrogen into helium each second, with a small fraction of that mass released as energy.
Its visible photosphere is not a solid surface. The plasma rotates faster at the equator than near the poles, while changing magnetic fields produce sunspots, flares and coronal mass ejections that can affect satellites, power systems and auroras at Earth.
Links
- Editorial guides
- Universe journey
- Sun & inner planets
- Preset views
- Wikipedia
- Sun on Wikipedia
Size neighbors
Objects near Sun on the scale
On the logarithmic size axis, Sun falls between 61 Cygni A and Sirius A. The band uses nearby Stars records.
Shared physical scale
7.95million km
Sources
References for Sun
Measurements and descriptive context are compiled by the Scale of Space team from the references below. If you find an error, please let us know.
- Sun — Wikipedia
- Visual reference: Wikimedia Commons (Solar Dynamics Observatory 2024 / NASA / SDO / HMI science team, Public domain)
Continue with nearby objects or open the full scale.
About
Scale of Space is a scroll-based journey through the universe, placing objects on a single logarithmic scale so you can compare size across an unbroken range.
Guides explain selected parts of that range, while focused views filter the objects by subject.