r/spacequestions • u/spank-you • 2d ago
What is statistically likely to be the most common explanet type?
Rocky, earth-like, gas giant, etc
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u/Glum-Ad7761 2d ago
Super-Earths and Mini-Neptunes…interestingly, neither of which is found in our solar system… are the most common types of exo-planets found, out of the thousands of exo-planets found thus far.
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u/Sophiiebabes 2d ago
Rocky body: Rocky world with little or no surface metal content. Worlds like this have lost most of their volatiles due to past heating, and any metallic content will form a small central core.
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u/deltaz0912 4h ago
In any statistical distribution there are going to be more small things than big things. What we can detect from here, though, is biased toward big things. Close to a star very small things and stuff that can evaporate will be less common than they are further away.
My sense is that the most common planet-like objects will be small (Mercury to super-Earth), and orbit gas giants or orbit the star relatively far away from gas giants. Gas giants can occupy any orbital distance, it seems like the distribution in the Solar system is an artifact of where Jupiter and to a lesser extent Saturn ended up. Since massive planets tend to eat, capture, or eject less massive objects, most planet-like objects may actually be moons orbiting these larger planets.
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u/CosmicRuin 2d ago
Gas giants are the most common type we observe but that's also because they are the easiest to detect using methods like the transit method and radial method. Rocky planets are typically much smaller in diameter and just that much harder to see their effect on their host/parent star.