The Colors of the Planets: What Are They and Why Do They Vary? planet colors

If you line up high resolution photos of all eight planets in our solar system, it looks almost like an artist sat down with...

What Is a Constellation? A Beginner’s Guide to the Sky’s 88 Star Patterns

A constellation is a group of stars that forms a recognizable pattern in the night sky, one we've given a name, usually after a mythological figure, animal, or object. There are 88 of them officially recognized, and together they map out the entire sky....

How Many Planets Are There? The Real Answer Is Bigger Than Eight

There are eight planets in our solar system: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn,...

What Is a Galaxy? A Simple Guide to the Great Islands of Stars

A galaxy is an enormous collection of stars, gas, dust, and dark matter, all...

How Many Planets Are There? The Real Answer Is Bigger Than Eight

There are eight planets in our solar system: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn,...

When Is the Next Meteor Shower in the US You Can See

Have you ever stood outside on a crisp, clear evening, feeling small beneath a...

How Far Is the Sun From Earth? The 93-Million-Mile Answer and Why It Keeps Changing

The Sun sits an average of about 93 million miles (150 million kilometers) from...

How Old Is the Universe? The 13.8-Billion-Year Answer and How We Measured It

The universe is about 13.8 billion years old. More precisely, 13.787 billion years, give...

Observing Basics: Supercharge Your Observing

Owning a telescope and actually knowing how to use it well are two completely different things. Plenty of people buy a scope, point it...

How Many Galaxies Are There in the Universe?

Try to imagine every grain of sand on every beach on Earth. Now imagine...

Planets Ranked by Size: All Eight Worlds From Biggest to Smallest

Here are the planets ranked by size, largest to smallest: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune,...

How Many Planets Are There? The Real Answer Is Bigger Than Eight

There are eight planets in our solar system: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn,...

Galaxies & Deep Space

Supermoon: What It Really Is, Why It Happens, and When to Catch the Next One

A supermoon is a full moon that lines up with the Moon's closest approach...

What Is a Constellation? A Beginner’s Guide to the Sky’s 88 Star Patterns

A constellation is a group of stars that forms a recognizable pattern in the...

How Many Planets Are There? The Real Answer Is Bigger Than Eight

There are eight planets in our solar system: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn,...

What Is a Galaxy? A Simple Guide to the Great Islands of Stars

A galaxy is an enormous collection of stars, gas, dust, and dark matter, all...

How Far Is the Sun From Earth? The 93-Million-Mile Answer and Why It Keeps Changing

The Sun sits an average of about 93 million miles (150 million kilometers) from...

When Is the Next Solar Eclipse: Your Guide to the Ring of Fire and the Eclipse of the Century

The Short Answer The next solar eclipse is an annular "ring of fire" on February...

August 12, 2026: The Day the Sky Puts on Three Shows at Once

Most years, skywatchers have to pick their moments. You wait for a meteor shower,...

What Is a Blood Moon, and Why Should You Watch the Sky This August 27th?

Mark your calendar, because the night of August 27th into the early morning of...

The Farm Boy Who Built a Telescope Out of a Buick and Found a Planet

A hailstorm wrecked the Tombaugh family's Kansas crops in the 1920s, wiping out any...

The 8 Phases of the Moon Explained: A Simple Guide to Waxing, Waning, and Everything in Between

Almost everyone has looked up at some point and wondered why the Moon keeps...

How Old is the Oldest Thing on the Planet from Our Solar System?

Ever look up at the night sky and wonder what's actually the oldest thing...

What Is Uranus’s Distance from the Sun? The Complete Guide to the Ice Giant’s Orbit

When you look up at the night sky Uranus is totally invisible to the...

What is the Distance from the Jupiter to the Sun? (Facts & Figures)

Ask most people to name the planets in order and they'll usually get through...

How Much Does the Earth Weigh: The Mind-Bending Number and How We Measured It

The Short Answer The Earth has a mass of about 5.97 x 10^24 kilograms. Written...

Planets

The Life Cycle of a Star: From Stellar Nursery to Spectacular Death

The Short Answer A star is born inside a giant cloud of gas and dust, spends most of its life steadily burning hydrogen, and then dies in one of two ways depending on its size. Sun-like stars swell into red giants and fade into quiet...

What Is a Nebula? The Birthplace of Stars Explained

Have you ever looked up at the night sky and wondered where our sun...

A Magnetar Just Gave Scientists the Best Evidence Yet That Empty Space Isn’t Really Empty

A quantum physics prediction sitting untested for 90 years may have finally found its...

What Is a Planet Alignment? The Truth About “Planet Parades” and How to See One

Every so often the internet lights up with breathless headlines about a rare planetary...

What Is a Galaxy? Learn About Stars Planets and More

Imagine standing in your backyard on a clear, moonless night. You look up and...

Space Missions

What Is Dark Matter? A Friendly Guide to the Mystery

Ever thought about the space between stars? Is it really empty, or is something invisible there? The Apple TV+ series based on Blake Crouch’s...

Astronomers Just Found Three Supermassive Black Holes Sharing One Galaxy

Most large galaxies host exactly one supermassive black hole at their center. A galaxy...

How Far Is the Sun From Earth? The 93-Million-Mile Answer and Why It Keeps Changing

The Sun sits an average of about 93 million miles (150 million kilometers) from...

The $10 Billion Telescope With 344 Ways to Die

On Christmas morning 2021, a rocket lifted off from French Guiana carrying humanity's most expensive scientific instrument ever built, and for the next two weeks, almost nobody involved in the project could relax. Not because the launch itself was risky. It went perfectly. The...

Upcoming Meteor Showers: The Complete Rest-of-2026 Calendar

Six more meteor showers cross Earth's path before the year is out, and two of them rank among the best of the entire year....

Planet Earth

Is the Moon a Planet: Why Our Nearest Neighbour Doesn’t Make the Cut

The Short Answer No, the Moon is not a planet. It's a natural satellite, which...

For the First Time Ever, Something Watched Earth Disappear From Another World

At around 7 p.m. local time on Mars, on a dusty rim overlooking Jezero...

A 14-Year-Old Watched Her Hero Launch on TV. Today, She’s Making the Same Kind of History Herself.

In 1996, a 14-year-old girl in France sat in front of a television watching...

How Many Moons Does Jupiter Have? The 2026 Count

Jupiter has 115 officially recognized moons as of August 2026, according to NASA and...

What Is a Pulsar? The Spinning Stellar Lighthouses of the Galaxy

In the summer of 1967, a 24 year old graduate student named Jocelyn Bell Burnell was combing through reams of paper printouts from a brand new radio telescope at Cambridge, hundreds of feet of data every single week, when she noticed something odd. A...

All Articles

How Many Galaxies Are There in the Universe?

Try to imagine every grain of sand on every beach on Earth. Now imagine...

Why Is Mars Called the Red Planet?

If you step outside on a clear night and look up at the right...

What Is the Speed of Light?

Light is one of those things we see every day without really thinking about...

How Old Is the Universe?

Look up at the night sky sometime and it's hard not to wonder how...

Why Does Saturn Have Rings But Earth Doesn’t Explained

Have you ever gazed at the night sky and wondered about the majestic beauty...

Discover 10 Space Facts That Sound Fake But Are True

Have you ever wondered if the universe is playing a trick on your imagination?...