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Is There a Reference for Average Distance Between Stars in the Milky Way?

-- David | February 18, 2022

Question:

what is the standard reference or references used to determine the average distance between stars in the milky way galaxy?

-- David

Answer:

I don’t believe that there is a standard reference for the average distance between stars in the Milky Way galaxy as this distance is a rather subjective estimate. As noted in the answer to a previous question on this blog, the average distance between stars in the Milky Way is about 5 light years. Note, though, that this estimate has a large uncertainty. To understand what makes this estimate so uncertain, see the nice discussion on Physics StackExchange which describes some of the issues which affect this estimate.

-- Jeff Mangum

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