About The Mass Scale
Created by Nolan Schleiff
Scroll down to go from the mass of everything in the observable universe to the lightest things physics can put a number on, about 107 powers of ten. The big number in the top left is the mass you're looking at, in kilograms. Each stop is shown with how many times heavier it is than the next one.
What's Simplified
- Masses are real but often approximate, and estimates for some of them, especially stars, black holes and galaxies, differ between studies.
- Mass can't be drawn to scale the way size can, so every stop is drawn at the same size on screen. A blue whale and a proton look equally big here; the numbers tell you how different they are.
- A dotted circle marks an upper limit. The neutrino and the photon have never been weighed: experiments only show they're lighter than these values.
- The universe's mass counts ordinary matter only. The Milky Way's includes its dark matter.
- Animations are illustrations, not simulations.
Sources
- Planck mass, proton and electron masses: CODATA recommended values.
- Photon mass limit: Particle Data Group review.
- Neutrino mass limit: the KATRIN experiment (2025).
- The Sun, planets and the Moon: NASA planetary fact sheets. Ceres: NASA's Dawn mission.
- Sagittarius A*: the Event Horizon Telescope collaboration (2022) and stellar-orbit measurements.
- Laniakea: Tully et al., Nature (2014).
- Ordinary matter in the observable universe: standard cosmology using ESA Planck mission results.
Get Involved
Spotted a mistake or want something added? Leave a suggestion. Enjoying it? Support the project.
A text version of every stop is available for screen readers.
See the other scales on the home page.
Scale Of Everything™ · © 2026 Nolan Schleiff. All rights reserved.