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How big is The Sun?

The Sun is 1,400,000 kilometers

Introduction

Ever wondered what’s the biggest thing in our solar system? The answer is shining brightly in our sky every day. Yes, it’s the Sun! The Sun is the star at the center of our solar system. It might look small from where we are, but in reality, it is so large that you could fit more than a million Earths inside it. Let’s explore more about the impressive size of the Sun and see how it compares to other objects we know.

The Size of the Sun

The Sun is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to dazzling brightness by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. This gigantic star has a radius of about 695,000 kilometers (432,000 miles). In simpler terms, if we consider the Sun as a ball, then the distance from its center to its surface is 432,000 miles. That’s about 109 times the radius of Earth. If you could somehow drive a car straight up into the sky at a speed of 60 miles per hour, it would take you more than a year to reach the Sun!

The Sun’s Mass

The Sun isn’t just big in size; it’s also incredibly heavy. Its mass, or the amount of matter it contains, is about 330,000 times that of Earth. To give you an idea, if Earth were the size of a nickel, the Sun would weigh as much as a six-story building made entirely of nickels!

Sun Compared to Other Objects

  • The Sun is so large that you could fit 1.3 million Earths inside it. That’s like stuffing over a million basketballs into a ball the size of a six-story building. - The Sun’s volume is so big that it makes up about 99.86% of the total mass of the Solar System. That means almost everything you see in the sky at night, including all the planets, moons, asteroids, and comets, together make up less than 0.15% of the Solar System’s mass. - The Sun is about 109 times the diameter of Earth. To put that in perspective, if the Sun were the size of a beach ball, the Earth would be the size of a small pebble. - Despite its enormous size, the Sun is not the biggest star in the universe. There are stars out there, like UY Scuti and VY Canis Majoris, which are much larger. If the Sun were the size of a basketball, these stars would be the size of a small house!

What’s Inside the Sun?

The Sun is mostly made up of hydrogen (about 73%), the lightest and most abundant element in the universe. The rest is mostly helium (about 25%), with a tiny amount of heavier elements like oxygen, carbon, neon, and iron. These elements are heated to such high temperatures that they glow with an intense light, which is the sunlight we see and feel on Earth.

Conclusion

The Sun, our very own star, is a giant in every sense of the word. Its colossal size and mass dominate our solar system, making life on Earth possible. So the next time you look up at the sky on a bright sunny day, remember, you’re looking at a star that’s so big, a million Earths could fit inside it!

Smaller By Category
Alpha Centauri B
Alpha Centauri B is the second largest star in the Alpha Centauri star system. Its diameter is approximately 1.25 million kilometers, so it is slightly smaller than the Sun. Alpha Centauri A & B are so close they appear as a single star to us Earthlings.
Gliese 229A
Gliese 229A is a red dwarf star. It is a bit smaller than the Sun, but much less massive. The red dwarf star is also written as GJ 229 or GI 229. It is part of a binary star system, the second star being Gliese 229B.
Luyten's Star
Luyten's Star is a red dwarf star 12 light-years away from us. It is so close to the star Procyon that Procyon appears 10 times brighter to Luyten's Star than Sirius appears to us.
Larger By Category
Alpha Centauri A
Alpha Centauri A is the largest star of the Alpha Centauri star system (composed of three stars), which is the closest star system to us. It is also the fourth brightest star in the night sky.
Sirius A
Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. It is almost twice as bright as Canopus, the second brightest star. However, Sirius is not a large star. It only appears bright because it is close to us, at only eight light-years away.
Pollux
In Greek mythology, Pollux's twin is Castor. They are also stars in the constellation Gemini, meaning "twins". However, in reality, Pollux is a single star, while Castor is three binary stars, for a total of six stars. Castor is a set of sextuplets!