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Proper Name	Pluto
Minor Planet Designation	134340 Pluto
Provisional Designation	Not applicable
Orbital Period	249 years 90,777.6 days
Distance from the Sun	Semi-Major Axis: 5,906,423,000 km (39.48 AU) Perihelion: 4,436,905,000 km (29.66 AU) Aphelion: 7,375,941,000 km (49.31 AU)
Rotation Period	6 days, 9 hours, 18 minutes
Diameter	2,370 km
Mean Surface Temperature	53 K (-220°C)
Moons	Charon, Hydra, Kerberos, Nix, Styx
Parent star	The Sun, yellow dwarf
Other planets in this system	Mercury, terrestrial planet Venus, terrestrial planet Earth, terrestrial planet Mars, terrestrial planet Jupiter, gas giant Saturn, gas giant Uranus, ice giant Neptune, ice giant Numerous dwarf planets, asteroids and other bodies
Notes	The largest of a group of objects orbiting the Sun beyond Neptune, and sharing a specific resonance with Neptune's own orbit. These objects are known as plutinos after their largest and best-known member.

Frosted with methane ice, tiny Pluto lies so far out in the depths of the Solar System that Sunlight takes more than four hours to reach it.

Pluto's diameter is just 2,370km, which is less than a fifth that of Earth. In fact, the planet Pluto is smaller than many of the Solar System's moons, including Earth's.

Use the scrollbar on the right of this window to explore the moons of Pluto, shown to scale. (Values shown are mean distances from Pluto).

The distant member of the Sun's family, Pluto pursues a wildly eccentric orbit, sometimes even coming nearer to the Sun than Neptune.

The view from Pluto of its snowball moon, Charon. Compared to its parent planet, Charon is huge - more than half Pluto's diameter - and for this reason Pluto is sometimes referred to as a 'double planet'.

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