What distance separates the Milky Way Galaxy and the Andromeda Galaxy within the Local Group?
Answer
About 2.5 million light-years
The Local Group is gravitationally bound, but its two largest members, the Milky Way and the Andromeda Galaxy, are separated by a vast gulf of intergalactic space. This separation distance is precisely quantified as being around 2.5 million light-years. This distance helps establish the scale of the Local Group itself, which has an approximate total diameter of about 10 million light-years. This measurement is crucial context when comparing the Local Group to the next tier, the Virgo Supercluster, which is over ten times larger than the Local Group’s diameter.
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