Illustration showing the orbit (red arrow) of Uranus around the Sun. Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun, with an average distance from it of about 2.9 billion kilometres. It takes just over 84 years to orbit the Sun but only just over 17 hours to rotate (green arrows) around its own axis. Unlike most planets in the solar system it rotates in a clockwise direction. Its axis of rotation is tilted to the plane of its orbit by so much (over 97 degrees) that its equator is nearly at a right angle to its orbit. This is thought to be the result of a collision with an Earth-sized object billions of years ago. For a labelled version of this image see C058/1009.