Others look more like eggs or footballs, and still others have no form at all. The universe may contain 50 billion galaxies, or even more. The smallest galaxies contain only a million stars or so. The Milky Way is home to several hundred billion stars. And the largest galaxies contain more than one trillion stars.
Galaxies also contain vast clouds of gas and dust, which are the raw materials for new stars.
Galaxies are sprinkled throughout the universe. These are our nearest galactic neighbors. Although they're just down the block by astronomical standards, they are so far away that the light their stars produce today won't reach us for tens of thousands or even millions of years. The farthest galaxies lie as far away as our telescopes can see. Some of them may be 10 billion light-years away or farther.