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The Solar System, sizes to scale

Every planet at its true size, from a dot to a disc thirty times wider, each opening its facts.

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Everything on this diagram

The same content as the picture, as text: every part and what it says when you open it.

The Sun

An ordinary star, and the centre of everything here. Drawn to the same scale as the planets, only the edge of it fits on the page.

Diameter
About 1.39 million km, 109 Earths
Holds
About 99.8% of the Solar System's mass
Light reaches Earth in
About 8 minutes 20 seconds

Asteroid belt

Millions of rocky fragments circling between Mars and Jupiter - far more spread out than any picture shows. Its largest member is the dwarf planet Ceres.

Lies
About 2.2–3.2 AU from the Sun
Largest member
Ceres, about 940 km across
Total mass
A few per cent of the Moon's

Saturn's rings

Countless pieces of ice and rock, from grains of dust to boulders the size of a house, each orbiting Saturn on its own. Broad, and astonishingly thin.

Made of
Ice, with some rock
Main rings span
About 270,000 km
Thickness
Often only tens of metres

Mercury

The smallest planet and the closest to the Sun. With almost no air to hold heat, its days are scorching and its nights far below freezing.

Diameter
4,879 km
From the Sun
0.39 AU (58 million km)
Year
88 Earth days
Sunrise to sunrise
176 Earth days
Moons
None

Venus

Nearly Earth's size, wrapped in thick cloud of carbon dioxide that traps heat. It is the hottest planet, and it spins backwards.

Diameter
12,104 km
From the Sun
0.72 AU (108 million km)
Year
225 Earth days
Surface
About 465 °C
Moons
None

Earth

The only world known to have life and liquid water on its surface. Its distance from the Sun defines the astronomical unit, AU.

Diameter
12,742 km
From the Sun
1 AU (150 million km)
Year
365.25 days
Day
24 hours
Moons
One

Mars

A cold desert world, red from iron oxide - rust - in its dust. It has the tallest volcano in the Solar System, Olympus Mons.

Diameter
6,779 km
From the Sun
1.52 AU (228 million km)
Year
687 Earth days
Day
About 24 h 40 min
Moons
Two: Phobos and Deimos

Jupiter

The largest planet, more than twice the mass of all the others together. Its Great Red Spot is a storm wider than Earth.

Diameter
139,820 km
From the Sun
5.2 AU (778 million km)
Year
11.9 Earth years
Day
About 9 h 56 min
Made of
Mostly hydrogen and helium

Saturn

A gas giant so light for its size that it is less dense than water. Its rings are the brightest and broadest in the Solar System.

Diameter
116,460 km
From the Sun
9.5 AU (1.43 billion km)
Year
29.4 Earth years
Day
About 10 h 34 min
Made of
Mostly hydrogen and helium

Uranus

An ice giant tipped on its side, so each pole has decades of sunlight followed by decades of dark.

Diameter
50,724 km
From the Sun
19.2 AU (2.87 billion km)
Year
84 Earth years
Day
About 17 h 14 min
Tilt
About 98°

Neptune

The farthest planet: a cold, dark ice giant with the fastest winds measured anywhere in the Solar System.

Diameter
49,244 km
From the Sun
30.1 AU (4.5 billion km)
Year
165 Earth years
Day
About 16 h 6 min
Winds
Up to about 2,000 km/h