Planets orbit the Sun because of the Sun's powerful gravity, which pulls them toward it, and the planets' sideways motion or velocity that keeps them from falling into the Sun. This balance between gravitational pull and the planets' inertia creates stable orbits around the Sun. The Sun contains about 99.8% of the total mass of the Solar System, resulting in a strong gravitational field that attracts planets and other objects. As planets move forward at a sufficient speed, their path curves around the Sun instead of crashing into it, causing them to continuously orbit. This orbit is a result of the planets essentially "falling" toward the Sun but having enough sideways velocity to keep missing it. The orbits are typically elliptical due to variations in the gravitational force as the planet moves closer or farther from the Sun. Furthermore, these orbital motions originated during the formation of the Solar System, which began from a spinning cloud of gas and dust collapsing under gravity. The conservation of angular momentum caused this cloud to spin faster and flatten into a disk where planets formed and retained their orbital paths around the central Sun. Thus, the orbits result from the interplay of the Sun's gravitational pull and the planets' inertia moving them forward at the right speeds, maintaining their paths in stable orbits.
