There Are More Stars in the Universe Than Grains of Sand on Earth

The Numbers

Astronomers estimate there are roughly 2 trillion galaxies in the observable universe. Our own Milky Way contains an estimated 100–400 billion stars. Multiplying that out gives approximately 10²⁴ stars — that's 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.

The number of grains of sand on all of Earth's beaches, deserts, and ocean floors has been estimated by researchers at the University of Hawaii at around 7.5 × 10¹⁸ — about 7.5 quintillion grains.

The universe contains roughly 100,000 times more stars than grains of sand on Earth.

For every grain of sand on Earth, there are 100,000 stars in the observable universe.

And That's Only the Observable Universe

The observable universe — the portion we can see because light has had time to reach us — is a sphere about 93 billion light years in diameter. The actual universe is almost certainly far larger, possibly infinite. We have no way of knowing how many stars lie beyond our observational horizon.

What About Planets?

Astronomers now believe that most stars host at least one planet. The Milky Way alone may contain trillions of planets. The number of planets in the observable universe likely exceeds the number of stars, pushing the total count into numbers that have no everyday analogue at all.