Question: how hot is the sun?

Julie Speakman answered on 21 Nov 2013:

Hello!
This is a more complicated question than you might imagine as the temperature varies at different parts of the sun.
In the centre or “core” of the sun temperatures can reach up to 15 million degrees centigrade. It is also tricky to say where the surface of the sun is as it is a big mass of burning chemicals really! There is a region called the “photosphere” where the heat/light radiated from the sun is considered to be what we think of as sunlight – in this region temperatures are a mere 5 and half thousand degrees centrigrade – so a thousand times cooler than in the middle.