How strong is gravity on Jupiter? About 2.4 to 2.7 times Earth’s

Gravity on Jupiter is about 2.4 to 2.7 times Earth’s: roughly 23.1 m/s² at the equator and 27.0 m/s² at the poles, with a mean of 25.9 m/s², according to NASA. The single figure most often quoted, 24.79 m/s², works out to about 2.5 times Earth’s gravity.

Jupiter has no solid surface, so these values apply at the cloud-top level where atmospheric pressure equals 1 bar, close to air pressure at sea level on Earth. Even so, Jupiter has the strongest surface gravity of any planet in the Solar System.

Key facts about Jupiter’s gravity

• Mean gravity at 1 bar: 25.92 m/s², or 2.64 times Earth’s mean of 9.82 m/s².
• Equator vs poles: 23.12 m/s² at the equator and 27.01 m/s² at the poles, a 17% difference caused mainly by rapid spin.
• Mass and size: 317.8 times Earth’s mass, but 10.97 times Earth’s mean radius.
• Escape velocity: 59.5 km/s, 5.3 times Earth’s 11.19 km/s.
• Day length: 9.93 hours, the shortest of any planet.

Does Jupiter have more gravity than Earth?

Yes. At its 1-bar reference level, Jupiter’s gravity is between 2.4 and 2.7 times Earth’s, depending on latitude. A person standing on a platform there would feel more than twice as heavy as on Earth.

The surprise is that the factor is not much larger. Jupiter has 318 times Earth’s mass, yet its surface gravity is less than three times as strong. The reason is distance from the centre, explained in the calculation below.

What does “surface gravity” mean on a planet with no surface?

NASA notes that Jupiter, as a gas giant, does not have a true surface. Its atmosphere of mostly hydrogen and helium gets steadily denser and hotter with depth, with no ground to stand on.

Scientists therefore use a convention. Radius, gravity and escape velocity for the giant planets are quoted at the altitude where the pressure is 1 bar. At that level on Jupiter, NASA’s fact sheet lists a temperature of 165 K (−108 °C) and a gas density of only 0.16 kg/m³. An object released there would not land; it would keep falling into deeper, denser layers.

Why do sources say 23.1, 24.8 or 25.9 m/s²?

All three are correct for their definitions. Jupiter’s fast spin and flattened shape make the choice matter more than for Earth or Mars.

Sources: NASA NSSDCA Jupiter and Earth fact sheets (equatorial with rotation, mean and polar rows); NASA JPL Solar System Dynamics, Planetary Physical Parameters (equatorial without rotation). Ratios calculated by SciQuest.

The 24.79 m/s² value, from NASA JPL’s planetary physical parameters, is the source of the familiar “2.5 times” figure. NASA’s current fact sheet instead leads with the equatorial value including rotation, 23.1 m/s², or 2.36 times Earth’s. Whichever you use, compare it with Earth’s value under the same definition.

How is Jupiter’s gravity calculated?

For a non-rotating sphere, surface gravity is:

g = GM/R²

Here G is the gravitational constant, M is the planet’s mass and R is the distance from its centre. NASA gives Jupiter’s mass parameter, GM, as 1.26687 × 10¹⁷ m³/s², equivalent to a mass of 1.898 × 10²⁷ kg.

• Mean radius: R = 69,911 km = 6.9911 × 10⁷ m, so R² ≈ 4.8875 × 10¹⁵ m²
• g = 1.26687 × 10¹⁷ ÷ 4.8875 × 10¹⁵ ≈ 25.92 m/s²

The comparison with Earth explains why 318 times the mass gives less than three times the gravity:

Mass ratio ÷ (radius ratio)² = 317.83 ÷ (10.973)² = 317.83 ÷ 120.4 ≈ 2.64

At the 1-bar level you are about 11 times farther from Jupiter’s centre than you are from Earth’s, and gravity weakens with the square of that distance. That factor of about 120 cancels most of Jupiter’s enormous mass. Its low mean density, 1,326 kg/m³ compared with Earth’s 5,513 kg/m³, is why the planet is so large for its mass.

Why is gravity weaker at Jupiter’s equator than at its poles?

Rotation makes the difference, and it works against gravity at the equator rather than adding to it. Jupiter turns once every 9.93 hours, so its equatorial clouds travel at about 12.6 km/s. Part of gravity’s pull is used to keep that material moving in a circle, leaving less to press objects downward.

The spin has also flattened the planet. The equatorial radius at 1 bar is 71,492 km, but the polar radius is only 66,854 km, a difference of 4,638 km. At the poles you are closer to the centre and feel no spin effect, so gravity is strongest there.

The equatorial value can be reconstructed in three steps:

• Pull of a sphere at the equatorial radius: GM ÷ (71,492 km)² ≈ 24.79 m/s²
• Minus the spin effect, ω²R, where ω is the rotation rate: about −2.21 m/s²
• Plus a small boost from the mass in the equatorial bulge, calculated from Jupiter’s measured oblateness term J₂: about +0.55 m/s²

The result, about 23.13 m/s², matches NASA’s 23.12 m/s² within rounding. That three-step reconciliation, calculated by SciQuest from fact-sheet values, is why one planet can have several “correct” gravity values.

How much would you weigh on Jupiter?

Your mass would not change, but your weight, the force of gravity on that mass, would. Weight equals mass × gravitational acceleration and is measured in newtons (N).

Calculated by SciQuest with standard gravity (9.80665 m/s²) for Earth and NASA’s 1-bar values of 23.12 m/s² (equator) and 27.01 m/s² (poles) for Jupiter. Scale readings are mass × Jupiter g ÷ 9.80665.

Earlier versions of this page said a 100 kg person would “weigh 2,470 kilograms” on Jupiter. That mixed up units: 100 kg × 24.79 m/s² is about 2,480 newtons, which an Earth-calibrated scale would display as about 253 kg.

How does NASA’s Juno spacecraft measure Jupiter’s gravity?

Juno entered orbit around Jupiter on July 5, 2016. Its gravity experiment relies on the Doppler effect. As Jupiter’s gravity tugs on the spacecraft, its speed changes very slightly, shifting the frequency of radio signals exchanged with NASA’s Deep Space Network. Juno uses X-band and Ka-band radio links, and a Deep Space Network antenna at Goldstone, California, is equipped for both.

Those measurements changed the picture of Jupiter’s interior. A 2017 study in Geophysical Research Letters by S. M. Wahl and colleagues found that interior models fit Juno’s gravity data better with a “dilute” core: heavy elements spread across a significant fraction of the planet’s radius rather than packed into a compact ball. The authors estimated that the core contains 7 to 25 Earth masses of heavy elements, depending on the model. NASA now describes Jupiter’s core as much larger than expected and not solid.

Does Jupiter’s gravity affect Earth?

Yes, but weakly and over long timescales. Using Newton’s law, F = G × M_Earth × M_Jupiter ÷ r², the force between the two planets ranges from about 2.2 × 10¹⁸ N at their closest, 588.5 million km apart, to about 8.1 × 10¹⁷ N at their farthest, 968.5 million km apart. That sounds large, but it gives Earth an acceleration of less than one-millionth of a metre per second squared.

Over hundreds of thousands of years, the effect adds up. Gravitational interactions involving Jupiter and Venus drive a 405,000-year cycle in the shape of Earth’s orbit. A 2018 study in PNAS by D. V. Kent and colleagues found evidence in rock layers that this cycle has remained stable for at least 215 million years. Orbital cycles like it are thought to help pace Earth’s long-term climate, not its day-to-day weather.

The popular idea that Jupiter acts as a shield protecting Earth from impacts is less certain. Simulations of asteroids by J. Horner and B. W. Jones, published in 2008, found that a giant planet in Jupiter’s position can significantly increase the rate of asteroid impacts on Earth rather than reduce it.

How does Jupiter’s gravity compare with other worlds?

Source: NASA NSSDCA fact sheets. Giant-planet values apply at the 1-bar pressure level and should not be treated as the gravity of a solid surface.

Saturn, the other gas giant, has 95 times Earth’s mass but gravity close to Earth’s, as SciQuest explains in how strong gravity is on Saturn. For the rocky end of the scale, see gravity on Mars and gravity on the Moon. Every planet is compared in one table in our guide to gravity on other planets.

What scientists do not know yet

Jupiter’s gravity at the 1-bar level is known precisely. What lies beneath is still debated. The size and composition of the dilute core depend on the equations of state that researchers assume for hydrogen and helium at extreme pressures, which is why published core estimates span a wide range. Juno’s gravity data, together with models of how deep Jupiter’s winds extend, have narrowed those possibilities but not settled them.

Related reading

• Jupiter vs the Sun: how many Jupiters can fit inside the Sun?
• JUICE: the spacecraft exploring Jupiter and its moons
• Gravity on other planets: every planet compared

Update note: This article was substantially revised on October 12, 2026. We replaced three inconsistent gravity values and the incorrect 2.4× ratio with NASA’s equator, pole and mean values and explained the 24.79 m/s² figure; corrected the claim that rapid rotation strengthens gravity (it weakens it at the equator); corrected Jupiter’s radius (69,911 km, not 69,111 km), rotation period (9.93 h, not 9.64 h) and the “2,470 kilograms” weight error; replaced the outdated solid-core claim with Juno results; corrected the gravitational constant’s sign error; and qualified claims about Jupiter shielding Earth. It was drafted with AI assistance and checked against the sources listed below.

Sources

• NASA NSSDCA, Jupiter Fact Sheet
• NASA NSSDCA, Earth Fact Sheet and Planetary Fact Sheet
• NASA NSSDCA, Planetary Fact Sheet Notes
• NASA JPL Solar System Dynamics, Planetary Physical Parameters
• NASA Science, Jupiter Facts
• NASA NSSDCA spacecraft catalog, Juno
• Southwest Research Institute / NASA Juno mission, Gravity Science
• Wahl, S. M., et al. (2017), Comparing Jupiter interior structure models to Juno gravity measurements and the role of a dilute core, Geophysical Research Letters 44:4649–4659
• Kent, D. V., et al. (2018), Empirical evidence for stability of the 405-kiloyear Jupiter–Venus eccentricity cycle over hundreds of millions of years, PNAS 115:6153–6158
• Horner, J., and Jones, B. W. (2008), Jupiter – friend or foe? I: the asteroids, International Journal of Astrobiology 7:251–261