The Galactic Bar and Bulge

Dense elongated bar of old stars at the galaxy's center, surrounded by a rounder bulge.

What it is

Part of the galaxy: Parts of a galaxy rather than objects in it: arms, bars, the bulge. Every kind of thing there is →

What you will really see

With your own eyes

Not one object but a river of countless faint stars — the glow of our own galaxy.

🔭 See it drawn as it looks through a telescope

🖨️ A sheet to print for this

🖨️ Print a sheet and go and look

🖨️ Sheet to take outside →

Worth knowing about the Galactic Bar and Bulge

On the 100-meter-track scale model of the Milky Way, the galaxy's central bulge starts about 26 meters from the Sun. Light takes 26 thousand years to get here from the Galactic Bar and Bulge, so what you are looking at is the Galactic Bar and Bulge as it was 26 thousand years ago.

What it is made of: A dense, elongated bar-shaped concentration of old stars at the galaxy's center, with a rounder bulge of stars around it.; How we know: The motions and clustering of gas and stars near the center only make sense as an elongated bar, confirmed against other barred spiral galaxies seen face-on. Rung 6 of the cosmic ladder — the distance to other galaxies
What makes it worth knowing: Gas funneled inward along the bar likely helps feed material toward Sagittarius A* over time; bars like ours are common in spiral galaxies.

The numbers

Distance from us	central bulge begins ~26,000 light-years away

Next to it

The Orion Armpart of the galaxyNot observable

The Stellar Halopart of the galaxyNot observable

The Dark Matter Halopart of the galaxyNot observable

The Milky Wayspiral galaxyNaked eye

Proxima CentauristarWith effort

Alpha Centauri A & Bbinary star systemNaked eye

📖 How the Milky Way fits together

Then go outside

Too big to look at all at once — but the things inside it are not. The Planetarium will show you which are up.

🌙 Plan an evening outside 🌌 Everything else in the sky