What is the Sun's age?

The Sun is about 4.6 billion years old. This estimate describes the age of the Sun and the Solar System, which formed from the same collapsing cloud of gas and dust.

Scientists determine this age using several lines of evidence. Computer models of stellar evolution indicate when a star with the Sun's mass and composition would have formed and reached its present stage. That result agrees with radiometric dating of meteorites, which condensed from the early Solar System. Some of the oldest meteorite material dates to about 4.567 billion years ago.

The Sun began when gravity pulled part of a giant molecular cloud inward. As the cloud collapsed, it spun into a young Sun surrounded by a disk of leftover material. That disk eventually produced the planets, moons, asteroids, and comets. The Sun then became a main-sequence star powered by hydrogen fusion in its core.

A frequent mix-up is 13.8 billion years, which is the approximate age of the universe, not the Sun. The Sun is a middle-aged star and is expected to remain on the main sequence for roughly another five billion years before expanding into a red giant.