How Many Earth Can Fit in Sun
Discover how many Earths can fit in the Sun and explore the Sun's vast size compared to planets in our Solar System.
While our Sun is considered an average-sized star, it is undeniably the largest entity within our Solar System. Remarkably, the Sun constitutes approximately 99.8% of the total mass of our Solar System, leaving a mere 0.2% for all the planets combined. This immense proportion underscores just how significant the Sun is compared to the rest of the Solar System.
When exploring the question of how many Earths can fit in the Sun, the answer varies based on the criteria used—mass, volume, or diameter. If we consider volume, the Sun's volume is around 1.412 million trillion cubic kilometers (1,412,000 x 10^12 km³), while Earth’s volume stands at approximately 1.083 trillion cubic kilometers (1.083 x 10^12 km³). This means that, theoretically, you could fit about 1.3 million Earths inside the Sun, assuming the Earths could be compressed and packed together without any empty space.
In terms of diameter, the Sun measures about 1,392,000 kilometers (864,000 miles), in stark contrast to Earth's diameter of 12,742 kilometers (7,917 miles). This size difference implies that you could line up 109 Earths across the face of the Sun. Additionally, the Sun's surface area is a staggering 12,000 times greater than that of Earth.
Curiously, if we consider the sizes of the largest and smallest planets in our Solar System, we find even more fascinating figures. Jupiter, the giant of the Solar System, has a mass of approximately 1,900 x 10^24 kg, which is 318 times that of Earth. You could fit about 1,000 Jupiters inside the Sun.
On the other end of the spectrum, Mercury, the smallest planet, has a mass of only 0.330 x 10^24 kg, meaning it would take around 21.2 million Mercurys to fill the Sun. As for the dwarf planet Pluto, it possesses merely 1% of Earth’s mass, indicating that more than 200 million Plutos would be needed to equal the Sun's mass. Our Moon, being 400 times smaller than the Sun and 27 million times less massive, would require roughly 64.3 million Moons to match the Sun's mass.
In summary, when contemplating how many Earths can fit in the Sun, the answer reveals the staggering scale of our Sun and its dominance in the Solar System, where it plays an essential role in sustaining life on Earth and influencing the orbits and characteristics of the planets that circle around it.