The charted regions of the Solar System comprise the Sun, four terrestrial inner planets, the asteroid belt, four gas giant outer planets, and finally the Kuiper belt and the scattered disc. The hypothetical Oort cloud may also exist at a distance roughly a thousand times beyond these regions. The solar wind, a flow of plasma from the Sun, permeates the Solar System, creating a bubble in the interstellar medium known as the heliosphere, which extends out to the middle of the scattered disc.

In order of their distances from the Sun, the eight planets are:

Mercury (57,900,000 km)
Venus (108,000,000 km)
Earth (150,000,000 km)
Mars (228,000,000 km)
Jupiter (779,000,000 km)
Saturn (1,430,000,000 km)
Uranus (2,880,000,000 km)
Neptune (4,500,000,000 km)

As of mid-2008, five smaller objects are classified as dwarf planets, all but the first of which orbit beyond Neptune. These are:
Ceres (415,000,000 km, in the asteroid belt; formerly classed as the fifth planet)
Pluto (5,906,000,000 km, formerly classified as the ninth planet)
Haumea (6,450,000,000 km)
Makemake (6,850,000,000 km)
Eris (10,100,000,000 km)
Six of the planets and three of the dwarf planets are orbited by natural satellites, usually termed "moons" after Earth's Moon. Each of the outer planets is encircled by planetary rings of dust and other particles.

Most large objects in orbit around the Sun lie near the plane of Earth's orbit, known as the ecliptic. The planets are very close to the ecliptic while comets and Kuiper belt objects are usually at significantly greater angles to it.

All of the planets and most other objects also orbit with the Sun's rotation (counter-clockwise, as viewed from above the Sun's north pole). There are exceptions, such as Halley's Comet.

Kepler's laws of planetary motion describe the orbits of objects about the Sun. According to Kepler's laws, each object travels along an ellipse with the Sun at one focus. Objects closer to the Sun (with smaller semi-major axes) have shorter years. On an elliptical orbit, a body's distance from the Sun varies over the course of its year. A body's closest approach to the Sun is called its perihelion, while its most distant point from the Sun is called its aphelion. Each body moves fastest at its perihelion and slowest at its aphelion. The orbits of the planets are nearly circular, but many comets, asteroids and Kuiper belt objects follow highly elliptical orbits.

To cope with the vast distances involved, many representations of the Solar System show orbits the same distance apart. In reality, with a few exceptions, the farther a planet or belt is from the Sun, the larger the distance between it and the previous orbit. For example, Venus is approximately 0.33 astronomical units (AU) farther out than Mercury, while Saturn is 4.3 AU out from Jupiter, and Neptune lies 10.5 AU out from Uranus. Attempts have been made to determine a correlation between these orbital distances, but no such theory has been accepted.

Most of the planets in the Solar System possess secondary systems of their own. Many are in turn orbited by planetary objects called natural satellites, or moons, some of which are larger than planets. Most of the largest natural satellites are in synchronous orbit, with one face permanently turned toward their parent. The four largest planets also possess planetary rings, thin bands of tiny particles that orbit them in unison.

Informally, the Solar System is sometimes divided into separate regions. The inner Solar System includes the four terrestrial planets and the main asteroid belt. The outer Solar System is beyond the asteroids, including the four gas giant planets. Since the discovery of the Kuiper belt, the outermost parts of the Solar System are considered a distinct region consisting of the objects beyond Neptune.[3]

Dynamically and physically, objects orbiting the Sun are classed into three categories: planets, dwarf planets and small Solar System bodies. A planet is any body in orbit around the Sun that has enough mass to form itself into a spherical shape and has cleared its immediate neighbourhood of all smaller objects. By this definition, the Solar System has eight known planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. Pluto was demoted from planetary status, as it has not cleared its orbit of surrounding Kuiper belt objects. A dwarf planet is a celestial body orbiting the Sun that is massive enough to be rounded by its own gravity but which has not cleared its neighbouring region of planetesimals and is not a satellite. By this definition, the Solar System has five known dwarf planets: Ceres, Pluto, Haumea, Makemake, and Eris. Other objects that may become classified as dwarf planets are Sedna, Orcus, and Quaoar. Dwarf planets that orbit in the trans-Neptunian region are called "plutoids". The remainder of the objects in orbit around the Sun are small Solar System bodies.

Planetary scientists use the terms gas, ice, and rock to describe the various classes of substances found throughout the Solar System. Rock is used to describe compounds with high melting points (greater than roughly 500 K), such as silicates. Rocky substances are prevalent in the inner Solar System, forming most of the terrestrial planets and asteroids. Gases are materials with low melting points such as atomic hydrogen, helium, and noble gases; they dominate the middle region, comprising most of Jupiter and Saturn. Ices, like water, methane, ammonia, and carbon dioxide, have melting points up to a few hundred Kelvin. Icy substances comprise the majority of the satellites of the giant planets, as well as most of Uranus and Neptune (the so-called "ice giants") and the numerous small objects that lie beyond Neptune's orbit. The term volatiles refers collectively to all materials with low boiling points (less than a few hundred kelvin), including gases and ices; depending on the temperature, volatiles can be found as ices, liquids, or gases in various places in the Solar System.