Uranus Facts for Kids

14 Uranus Facts For Kids

1. The planet Uranus was formed from a small part of a giant molecular cloud that had a gravitational collapse about 4.6 billion years ago.
2. Uranus has been confused with a star throughout human history, until it’s officially discovery on March 13th, 1781, by German-born British astronomer William Herschel.
3. Uranus is classified as an ice giant planet.
4. Uranus’s atmosphere contains approximately 82.5% hydrogen, 15.2% helium and 2.3% methane.
5. Uranus is the seventh farthest planet from the Sun at 1,783,744,300 miles or 19.2 astronomical units.
6. Uranus is the third largest planet in our Solar System with a radius of 15,299 miles or 400% the size of Earth.
7. Light from the Sun takes 159.6 minutes (9,575 seconds) to reach Uranus.
8. Uranus completes an orbit around the Sun every 84.016846 Earth years.
9. Uranus completes a full planet rotation every 0.718 Earth days.
10. Uranus is the seventh coldest planet in our Solar System with an average surface temperature of -320 °F.
11. Uranus has 27 discovered moons (natural satellites).
12. Uranus is one of the four planets in our Solar System with a ring system.
13. The first spacecraft to explore and study Uranus was NASA’s Voyager 2 in 1968.
14. To date, no other man-made spacecraft has studied Uranus at a close distance other than Voyager 2.

Uranus Pictures

If a picture is worth a thousand words, then the below images will be helpful for your research on the planet Uranus. Below are three various pictures of Uranus. These pictures should help you better understand Uranus, one of the eight planets in our Solar System.

A picture of Uranus by Voyager 2.

Credit: NASA/JPL

Another picture of Uranus by Voyager 2.

Credit: NASA/JPL

A picture of Uranus by Hubble Telescope.

Credit: NASA/Space Telescope Science Institute