Power 10 · Superman, explained

Solar battery.

Earth's yellow sun, stored in every cell.

Read in depth All powers

Powered by: Earth's yellow sun
A battery since: The 1986 reboot
Intake: About 140 gigawatts, in one comic
Drained by: A red sun, or a solar flare

Dark, drained honeycomb cells of grey crystal

Scroll to charge

Empty. Charging. Full.

Earth's yellow sun, stored in every cell. The percentage is the scene's own, not a figure from the comics.

The short answer

Superman's powers come from the yellow sun. Since the 1986 reboot his cells work like solar batteries, storing sunlight so his powers work at night and indoors, and one comic puts his intake at about 140 gigawatts. Earlier stories credited evolution (1938) and Earth's lower gravity (the 1940s). A red sun, or using everything in a solar flare, drains him.

Updated 6 November 2026 · 2 sources

In depth

The full story.

Why can Superman fly, and why does he lose his powers under a red sun? The answer has changed three times since 1938. Today it’s simple: Superman is solar-powered.

How the explanation has changed

Era	Where his powers come from	Source	Confidence
1938	Evolution: Kryptonians are naturally stronger after millions of years. At first he has only strength and leaping	Action Comics #1	Confirmed
1944–45	Earth’s lower gravity; Kryptonians were powerless at home	More Fun Comics #101	Confirmed
1959–62	Partly lower gravity, partly “ultra solar rays”	Action Comics #262	Confirmed
1960	Red sunlight takes his powers away	Superman #141	Confirmed
1986 onwards	His cells are solar batteries: Krypton’s dim red sun only kept Kryptonians alive, while a yellow sun supercharges them	Byrne era; the issue isn’t named in our sources	Likely

How the solar battery works

Superman’s cells absorb yellow sunlight and store it. That stored energy powers everything from super-strength to heat vision. Because it’s stored, his powers keep working at night, indoors and underground. In Superman Unchained #2 (New 52), his intake is put at about 140 gigawatts.

Sunlight recharges the batteries, which is why the Superman (2025) Fortress has a healing sun chamber.

What drains his batteries

What	What happens	Confidence
A red sun	His powers fade, as on Krypton under Rao	Confirmed
The sun dimming	In The Final Night (1996) the Sun-Eater dims the sun; his powers fade until Superman Forever (1998)	Confirmed
His solar flare	A New 52 blast of all his stored energy that leaves him powerless for about a day (Superman #38)	Likely
Kryptonite	Weakens and hurts him while he’s near it	Confirmed

His body, explained

The solar battery explains much of Kryptonian biology: why he doesn’t need to eat or sleep, why he ages slowly and why alcohol doesn’t affect him. It doesn’t make him immune to everything. He can catch the rare Virus X, and Doomsday stopped his heart in 1992. For every power the sun gives him, see the list of Superman’s powers.

Era by era.

The same Superman, rewritten for every generation.

Golden Age (1938)

Kryptonians are naturally stronger after millions of years of evolution (Action Comics #1).

Golden Age (1944–45)

Earth's lower gravity gives him his powers; Kryptonians were powerless at home (More Fun Comics #101).

Silver Age (1959–1962)

Partly lower gravity, partly ultra solar rays (Action Comics #262). Red sunlight takes his powers away (Superman #141, 1960).

Post-Crisis (1986–2011)

His cells are solar batteries. In The Final Night (1996) the sun dims and his powers fade.

New 52 (2011–2016)

He absorbs about 140 gigawatts (Superman Unchained #2), and his solar flare empties his reserves (Superman #38).

Questions.

Where do Superman's powers come from?

His Kryptonian cells act like solar batteries. They store yellow sunlight, which powers him. Under a red sun, like Krypton's, he becomes as weak as a human. Golden Age stories credited Earth's lower gravity instead (More Fun Comics #101, 1944–45); Action Comics #262 combined gravity with solar rays before the sun took over.

Does Superman lose his powers at night?

No. Since the 1986 reboot his cells store solar energy like batteries, so his powers keep working at night and indoors. They only fade if he runs the batteries down, for example under a red sun, after a solar flare, or when the sun itself is dimmed, as in The Final Night (1996).

What is Superman's solar flare?

A modern power introduced in Superman (vol. 3) #38 (February 2015) by Geoff Johns and John Romita Jr. He releases all his stored solar energy in one huge blast. Afterwards he's powerless for about 24 hours, so it's a last resort.