The Scale of the Universe

The Scale of the Universe is an interactive online visualization tool and website first created in 2010 by twins Cary and Michael Huang, based in Moraga, California.^{[1][2][3][4][5]} Released on Newgrounds and the Huang brothers' web page, it features a scrollbar that players can use to navigate through orders of magnitude and view various objects within such size ranges. Sliding the scrollbar to the left and right causes the screen to zoom in and out respectively, utilizing resolution independence in the process.^[1]

Michael Huang, one of the co-creators in 2025

The Scale of the Universe
Title screen of the first edition
Developer(s)	Cary Huang, Michael Huang
Composer(s)	Kevin MacLeod, Cliff Martinez
Engine	Adobe Flash
Platform(s)	Web-based
Release	2010
Genre(s)	Edutainment

In 2012, Cary and Michael Huang released a sequel titled The Scale of the Universe 2, in which clicking on objects brings up infoboxes that display information about them.^[6][7][8] The current version of The Scale of the Universe 2 uses Pixi.js instead of Flash, ported by Matthew Martori.^[6]

The Scale of the Universe was featured on NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day on October 7, 2018.^[9]

In 2020, animation studio Kurzgesagt released the app Universe in a Nutshell, which took inspiration from The Scale of the Universe.^[10][11]

The main-belt asteroid 10003 Caryhuang was officially named by the International Astronomical Union on June 16, 2021, partly in recognition of Cary Huang's involvement in The Scale of the Universe.^[2]

See also

• Cosmic Eye
• Cosmic Voyage
• Powers of Ten