Milky Way Perspective

Scientifically informed Artistically interpreted

Your cosmic address

See home from
the outside.

A journey from the ground beneath you to the galaxy that carries us—all of us—through the dark.

Earth · Home

Start with the only home we have ever known.

Every life, border, memory and future we have shared begins on one small world.

Perspective One shared world

About the model

A portrait drawn from within

We have never seen the Milky Way from the outside.

This is a scientifically informed artistic reconstruction—not a photograph or a navigational map. Dust obscures our view, spiral arms have soft and uncertain boundaries, and every top-down portrait is assembled from measurements made inside the galaxy.

≈100,000light-years across the main stellar disk
26,600light-years from the Sun to the galactic center
Hundreds of billionsof stars carried together
≈230 million yearsfor one Solar orbit of the galaxy

What this model preserves

A barred center, four irregular arm systems with two visually dominant stellar arms, a thin disk with soft edges, and our position in the Orion Spur between larger arms. Brightness, color, separation and camera transitions are intentionally exaggerated so the structure can be understood.

Move through it

Drag to orbit. Scroll or pinch to zoom. Use arrow keys to look around, + and − to zoom, R to reset, Space to pause motion, and Escape to leave the guided journey.

Sources

NASA Universe glossary ESA Gaia guide to our galaxy ESA Gaia top-down reconstruction NASA Sun facts

Our place in the Milky Way

Earth is our shared home. It travels with the Solar System around the Milky Way.

The Sun is one star among hundreds of billions. Our Solar System moves around the galaxy at about 720,000 kilometers per hour.

We live in the Orion Spur, between the Sagittarius and Perseus arms, about 26,600 light-years from the galactic center.

The Milky Way's main stellar disk is about 100,000 light-years across. One Solar orbit takes about 230 million years.

This is a scientifically informed artistic reconstruction made from our position inside the Milky Way.

Use the arrow keys to orbit the view, plus and minus to zoom, and R to reset the current perspective.