Distances in the Hubble eXtreme deep field

This image separates out the Hubble eXtreme Deep Field by the distances of objects within it.

The galaxies in the XDF are not close together — they lie along one long line of sight from Earth to the very edges of the visible Universe. The most distant objects within the XDF are more than 95% of the way back to the Big Bang, while a few stars in it are within the Milky Way.

In the left pane are objects whose light has taken less than 5 billion years to reach us. In the centre pane are objects whose light has taken 5 to 9 billion years to reach us. In the right pane are objects whose light has taken more than 9 billion years to reach us.