All Textbook Topics - Forces and Motion - Gravity Introduction - A gravitational field is a region where a mass will experience a force

A gravitational field is a region where a mass will experience a force

The gravitational field you find around a mass is a region where another mass will experience a force.

The nature of this force is very interesting because both the masses will exert an equal but opposite force on each other, see this effect in the diagram below: (Note the diagrams below are not to scale)

This diagram shows some example masses in the gravitational field of the Earth:

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All masses have a gravitational field around them, but any effect is weak unless the mass is very large
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The range of a gravitational field is infinite so all masses exert a force on all other masses through gravity, at great distance, the force is very, very small

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