"Very Easy" Mnemonics for the Planets

Memorizing the order of the planets in our solar system is very easy when you use mnemonics.

According to NASA, there are eight planets in our solar system. Beyond the eight planets are additional dwarf planets, including Pluto.

How to Memorize the Planets

A good mnemonic for the order of the planets is: “My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nachos.”

Here are the names of the planets with the corresponding mnemonics:

The mnemonic sentence we created is called an acrostic mnemonic (as opposed to an acronym). The first letter of each word in the sentence corresponds to the first letter of each planet: “My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nachos”.

There may be hundreds of dwarf planets, so those are usually left out of the main mnemonic, but if you want to remember Pluto as well, you can use “My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas.”

Pluto is now considered a dwarf planet, but people who were educated with older textbooks may want to include Pluto.

The “Very Easy Method” for Remembering the Planets

If you include Pluto, a good mnemonic for the order of the planets is “My (Mercury) Very (Venus) Easy (Earth) Method (Mars) Just (Jupiter) Speeds (Saturn) Up (Uranus) Naming (Neptune) Planets” (Pluto).

It’s okay to be creative! You can make your mnemonics as silly as you want, for example, “Many Vast Elephants Make Jam Sandwiches Under No Pressure”.

The Rhyme for Remembering the Planets

There’s also a famous rhyme for remembering the planets. It goes like this:

Amazing Mercury is closest to the Sun.
Hot, hot Venus is the second one.
Earth comes third, it’s not too hot.
Freezing Mars awaits an astronaut.
Jupiter is bigger than all the rest.
Sixth comes Saturn, its rings look best!
Uranus and Neptune are big gas balls.
Tiny Pluto is the last planet of all.

A Poem about the Planets

If you’re teaching kids the order of the planets, you can read them a poem.

In the depths of space, we find a sight
A solar system, planets in their might
Each one unique, with its own flair
From the Sun to Pluto, let’s take a stare
Mercury is first, closest to the Sun
It’s small and rocky, its orbit fast and fun
Temperatures extreme, too hot to touch
And too cold on the dark side, a world as such
Venus, second in line, a fiery ball
Greenhouse gases trap heat, warming it all
Its surface a desert, no water in sight
A runaway greenhouse, a world of might
Earth, our home, third from the Sun
With life in abundance, it’s second to none
Water and air, the essentials of life
A blue marble, unique and rife
Mars, the fourth planet, a red hue
Rocks and dust, a barren view
Ancient riverbeds, evidence of water past
A possible haven for life to last
Jupiter, fifth in line, the largest of all
A gas giant, a swirling, stormy ball
The Great Red Spot, a raging storm
Moons galore, a system to form
Saturn, sixth planet, with rings to behold
Ice and dust, a sight to be told
A system of moons, a diverse range
Enceladus, with geysers strange
Uranus, the seventh, an ice giant in sight
A tilted axis, seasons of light
A blue-green hue, a methane sky
Moons galore, a system to vie
Neptune, the eighth, the farthest from the Sun
A blue hue, a windy one
Storms like Jupiter, but colder still
A system of moons, with Triton’s chill
Pluto, a dwarf planet, a world of its own
Icy and rocky, a place unknown
A part of the Kuiper Belt, a faraway place
A planet, then not, its status to chase
The planets in order, a journey through space
Each unique, a wonder to embrace
From the Sun to Pluto, a story to tell
A solar system, in which we dwell.

Do you know any other mnemonics for planets? Share them in the Art of Memory Forum.