Neptune is the eighth planet from the Sun and the farthest planet in our solar system. It's a massive ball of gas and ice, more than 30 times farther from the Sun than Earth is. Neptune appears as a brilliant blue color because of methane gas in its atmosphere, which absorbs red light and reflects blue light back into space.

Neptune is so distant that it takes 165 Earth years to complete one orbit around the Sun. That means if you were born on Neptune, you'd wait more than a human lifetime just to celebrate your first birthday! The planet has the fastest winds in the solar system, with storms that rage at speeds up to 1,200 miles per hour.

Scientists didn't discover Neptune by seeing it first. Instead, astronomers noticed that Uranus wasn't moving quite as expected and realized another planet's gravity must be pulling on it. In 1846, they calculated where this mystery planet should be and found Neptune almost exactly where the math predicted, one of the greatest detective stories in astronomy.

Neptune takes its name from the ancient Roman god of the sea, which fits perfectly given the planet's deep ocean-blue appearance. The planet has 14 known moons, the largest being Triton, which orbits Neptune backward compared to most moons in the solar system.