Earth—our home planet—is the only place we know of so far that’s inhabited by living things. It's also the only planet in our solar system with liquid water on the surface.

Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun – a dusty, cold, desert world with a very thin atmosphere. Mars is also a dynamic planet with seasons, polar ice caps, canyons, extinct volcanoes, and evidence that it was even more active in the past.

Adorned with thousands of beautiful ringlets, Saturn is unique among the planets. It is not the only planet to have rings – made of chunks of ice and rock – but none are as spectacular or as complicated as Saturn's.

Jupiter's familiar stripes and swirls are actually cold, windy clouds of ammonia and water, floating in an atmosphere of hydrogen and helium. Jupiter’s iconic Great Red Spot is a giant storm bigger than Earth that has raged for hundreds of years.

The smallest planet in our solar system and nearest to the Sun, Mercury is only slightly larger than Earth's Moon. Because of Mercury's elliptical – egg-shaped – orbit, and sluggish rotation, the Sun appears to rise briefly, set, and rise again from some parts of the planet's surface.

Uranus—seventh planet from the Sun—rotates at a nearly 90-degree angle from the plane of its orbit. This unique tilt makes Uranus appear to spin on its side.