Local Group

The group of galaxies extending out for approximately five million light years from the Andromeda Galaxy and the Milky Way Galaxy, which together lie near its centre. With the Triangulum Galaxy, these three spirals are the largest galaxies in the group, but they are accompanied by more than forty lesser galaxies. Many of these additional galaxies (none of which are themselves spirals) exist as satellites to the main three, and especially to the Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxies.

The Local Group is itself a part of an even larger collection of galaxies, the Virgo Supercluster, which extends outwards some ten times further than the Local Group and includes many other groups, most notably the Virgo Cluster some fifty million light years beyond the Local Group.