How old is the universe compared to Earth?
Universe: 13.8 billion years
HistoryThe universe is about 13.8 billion years old. Earth formed about 4.54 billion years ago, so it has existed for about a third of cosmic time. The first stars lit up within a few hundred million years of the Big Bang. The earliest fossil evidence of life on Earth dates to about 3.5 billion years ago; complex animals only appear about 600 million years ago.
Source: Planck Collaboration (2020), Astronomy & Astrophysics; Dalrymple (2001), Geological Society Special Publications
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