Venus is the second planet from the Sun, the first being Mercury. Venus, like Earth, is an inner planet of the Solar System — a rock-type planet. It orbits the sun in about 225 Earth-days (that’s a Venusian year, shorter than ours by 40 days) and rotates on its axis every 243 Earth-days (the longest day of any planet in our Solar System; ours is 24 hours).
The rotation of Venus is east to west, opposite to ours. It spins almost upright, with an axial tilt of just 3 degrees and subsequently no seasonality like we do on Earth.
The Sun rises only twice in the Venusian year as it takes 117 Earth-days for Venus to go through its day-night cycle.
Venus is also called Earth’s sister planet because it has a similar size and composition to our own world. In addition, Venus orbits closer to us than any other planet in our solar system. This means that Venus appears brighter in the sky than any other celestial object besides the moon!
Metrics
Diameter: 7,520 miles (12,104 km)
Planet rotation time: 243.1 days
Distance from the Sun: 67,240,000 miles (108,200,000 km)
Revolution time around the Sun: 224.7 days
More info: In depth Venus by NASA
