Solar mass | |
---|---|
General information | |
Unit system | astronomy |
Unit of | mass |
Symbol | M☉ |
In SI base units | (1.98847±0.00007)×1030 kg[1] |
The solar mass (M☉) is a standard unit of mass in astronomy, equal to approximately 2×1030 kg. It is approximately equal to the mass of the Sun. It is often used to indicate the masses of other stars, as well as stellar clusters, nebulae, galaxies and black holes. This equates to about two nonillion (short scale), two quintillion (long scale) kilograms, 2000 quettagrams, or 2 quettakilograms:
The solar mass is about 333000 times the mass of Earth (ME), or 1047 times the mass of Jupiter (MJ).