Nonillion sounds like a fake number, but it actually has this many zeros in it:
1,420,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 degrees Celsius
If you follow the Farenhiet scale, it’s: 2,556,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 degrees.
That is the hottest known temperature in the universe. To give you a scale of how hot that actually is, we’ll compare the temperature of other known entities in the universe.
Let the Showdown begin
Starting off with the coldest possible temperature. That would be -273.15 degrees Celsius/-459.67 Fahrenheit.
At that temperature, there is no heat in that entity. That’s where the term ‘absolute zero’ comes from.
It’s also known as the absolute zero temperature.
Then there are some places in Russia where the coldest recorded temperature has reached about -67 degrees Celsius. It was recorded at Oymyakon weather station.
at -31 degrees Celsius, your phone has no chance of staying in working condition. That is the lowest temperature a cellphone has worked at.
Now we’re in fairly normal territory which is the melting point of water: 0 degrees Celsius. It’s the temperature that we all learned in school and probably the only temperature we’ll never have to guess to be correct.
The human body’s normal temperature is 37 degrees Celsius, and the lowest that’s been recorded in a living human is 13.7 degrees. The other end of the spectrum is 46.5 degrees. That’s the hottest temperature of a living human.
71 degrees is the highest naturally recorded temperature anywhere on the surface of the Earth. It happened in Lut Desert, Iran.
At 100 degrees, water boils. That’s also another temperature most of us remember from the school days.
If you ever experience temperatures of 125 degrees, your computer will stop working. After this point, Intel processors stopped working.
Tardigrades are micro-animals that are famous for being able to survive the worst living conditions. 151 degrees is the highest point they’ve survived in.
If you’re into F1, you’d know that the maximum temperature of an F1 car’s brakes is 750 degrees.
Let’s talk about planets & space now
The sun is hot and in a lot of places on Earth it’s becoming intolerable. On its surface, it heats up to 5,500 degrees. But the core of the Earth is even hotter at 6,000 degrees.
The Sirius dog star has recorded a temperature of 9,500 degrees.
Jupiter is pretty hot, but how much? A staggering 24,000 degrees.
The Eta Carinae stellar system, a pre-supernova star gave science a measure of 36,926 degrees.
The outer corona of the sun (not to be mixed with the coronavirus that has ruined everything) clocks in at 1,000,000 degrees.
The gases heated in a supernova attain a maximum temperature of 55,000,000 degrees.
When the universe was born, everything was hot and explosions were happening everywhere. When it was 100 seconds old, temperatures reached 1,000,000,000 degrees.
When a star collapses, it releases a neutron star. Those stars can reach a temperature of 99,999,999,726 degrees.
When the age of the universe was 0.0001 seconds old, things heated up to around 1,000,000,000,000 degrees. If we go back even further at 10^-35 seconds, it got around 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 degrees.
And then at last, we finally have 1,420,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 degrees. Absolute hot. Also known as the Planck temperature.
What’s special about this temperature?
At 142 nonillion, conventional physics breaks down and we can only theorize what will happen. Everything we know about physics can stop making sense at that point. Feel free to imagine what sort of changes you might see when that happen.
The inspiration for this article came from two places: this infographic from the BBC and this RealLifeLore video illustration.
If you enjoyed this article, read about what happens when you talk to plants!
I love understanding how different technologies work and explaining them to people. From tech guides to opinions, everything is interesting to me. Other than that, I enjoy writing about various science-related topics and conversing with people.