Study Guides/Physics/Real Colour of the Sun
Study Guide · Physics

What is the Real Colour of the Sun?

If someone asks you to draw the Sun, you will naturally reach for a yellow or orange crayon. But is the Sun actually yellow? Science has a surprising answer.

Question (Click to Flip)

What is the real color of the sun?

Answer

The real color of the Sun is pure white. It emits all colors of the visible spectrum equally, which combine to form white light. It only appears yellow from Earth due to our atmosphere scattering the blue light.

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Key Facts

Real Colour: Pure White (a mixture of all colors).

Perceived Colour: Yellow or Orange (due to atmospheric scattering).

Phenomenon: This scattering of light is called 'Rayleigh scattering'.

The True Colour of the Sun

If you were to travel into space (outside the Earth's atmosphere) and look at the Sun, you would see that its real colour is Pure White.

  • The Sun emits all the colors of the rainbow (Violet, Indigo, Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange, Red) in almost perfectly equal amounts.
  • When all these colors of visible light are mixed together, the resulting color is pure white. This is why astronauts in space see a white Sun.

Why does it look Yellow from Earth?

The Sun only looks yellow or red because of the Earth's Atmosphere.

  • When the white light from the Sun enters our atmosphere, gases and particles scatter the shorter wavelengths (blue and violet light) away.
  • Because the blue light is scattered across the sky (which is why the sky looks blue!), the remaining light that reaches our eyes directly from the Sun is mostly yellow, orange, and red.
  • During sunset, the light has to travel through even more atmosphere, scattering almost all colors except red, making the Sun look deep orange or red.

Questions and Answers

What is the real color of the sun?+

The real color of the Sun is pure white. It emits all colors of the visible spectrum equally, which combine to form white light. It only appears yellow from Earth due to our atmosphere scattering the blue light.

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