Uranus

Uranus - Rotating Model
Credit: Almond/NASA

Like Jupiter and Saturn, Uranus is a Gas Giant and thus its visible surface is not solid.

However, it is a blue-ish colour, rather than the yellow/orange of Saturn. This is because of the methane that exists in the cloud-tops of its much colder atmosphere.

Uranus has rings, like Saturn, but they are much thinner and far more difficult to see.

Uranus was the first planet to be discovered in modern times, and was found by the English astronomer William Herschel back in 1781.

The only space-probe to pass by Uranus was Voyager 2 in 1986.

Uranus has 27 known moons (as of 2009). 22 of these are very small and most orbit close to Uranus. The other five (Miranda, Ariel, Umbriel, Titania and Oberon) are larger and further out.

Planet Data Sheet show »

Facts and Figures	Mercury	Venus	Earth	Mars	Jupiter	Saturn	Uranus	Neptune
Orbital Distance (AU)¹	0.38	0.72	1.0	1.52	5.2	9.45	19.2	30.06
Radius (KM)	2,440	6,052	6,378	3,397	71,492	60,268	25,559	24,746
Mass (Earth Masses)²	0.055	0.82	1.0	0.11	318	95.2	14.5	17.1
Year Length (Earth Days)	88	225	365.25	687	11.9 Years	29.45 Years	84.0 Years	164.8 Years
Day Length (Earth Days)	176	117	1.0	1.03	0.41	0.43	0.75	0.67
Surface Gravity (g)³	0.38	0.91	1.0	0.38	2.34	0.93	0.92	1.12
Surface Temperature	-200 to 400 °C	460 °C	-80 to 50 °C	-150 to 20 °C	-110 °C	-140 °C	-190 °C	-200 °C
Number of moons	0	0	1	2	63	60	27	13

Notes: ¹ 1 AU (or Astronomical Unit) = 149,600,000 KM and is the mean distance from the Earth to the Sun
² 1 Earth Mass = 5,980,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 KG : ³ 1 g = 9.8 m/s²

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