An animated view of the Milky Way seen from above: a barred spiral of a few hundred billion stars, with the Sun marked on its orbit about 26,000 light-years from the galactic centre, circling once every 230 million years. The black hole Sagittarius A* sits at the centre.
Our galaxy
The Sun’s orbit around the Milky Way
The Sun sits ~26,000 light-years from the galactic centre, sweeping around it at ~220 km/s. One lap — a “galactic year” — takes about 230 million years.
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