• The Sun is the closest star to Earth.
• The Sun is easily the largest object in our solar system, contributing more than 99.8% of the system's total mass.
• The enormous mass of the Sun produces a gravitational pull that keeps the Earth and all other planets in the solar system in their own continuous orbit.
• Despite being so huge, the Sun is only an average star with a fairly typical size, age and temperature.
• At only 4.6 billion years old, the Sun isn't even middle-aged by comparison to some stars in our galaxy, which are nearer to 15 billion years old.
• During the next 5 billion years, the sun will become increasingly bright.

More facts on the sun

• The ancient Greeks named the sun 'Helios'.
• The ancient Romans named the sun 'Sol', which is still in use today.
• The surface temperature of the sun is approximately 10,000 degrees Farenheit
• It takes eight minutes for the light from the sun to reach the earth
• The sun rotates on its axis about once a month.
• The sun has a density that is 1.5 times that of water.
• The diameter of the sun is approximately 860,000 miles.
• Each year the sun loses about 360 million tons of weight
• The volume of the Sun is so enormous that it could easily contain more than 1 million earths.