How Old Is Galactus & Where Is He From?

Writing about Galactus is always interesting. He is among the most powerful and impactful characters in Marvel Comics, and yet much about him is relatively unknown. Everything from his exact powers, purpose, and origin is stepped into a lot of mystery, and there is a very good reason for that. Galactus is a cosmic being, a force of the cosmos with a special purpose. Without him, the Universe would unravel, and the balance itself would come under question. But there has to be a time before Galactus before he manifested in the Universe. So let’s see how old Galactus is and when and where he was born. 

Galactus is older than the Universe and older than time itself. His exact age is unknown, but it’s estimated that he is billions upon billions of years old. Galactus was born in the sixth Incarnation of the Universe on the planet Taa which predates our own universe, as a humanoid alien under the name Galan. Only after his Universe was destroyed was he reborn as a cosmic being under the name Galactus and was given a purpose to balance between Eternity and Death.  

Now that we’ve covered everything in short, it’s time to analyze it in more detail. Galactus’ origin story is too fascinating to be summed up in a single paragraph, so if you’re interested in more, stay with us and keep reading!

Galactus was born on the planet Taa in the sixth Incarnation of Universe 

Now it’s pretty common in fiction that Universes are often reset and basically destroyed so they could be created again, it’s a common motif even in some religions, and this is basically Galactus’ origin story. Before the current mainline Universe, the 8th Incarnation (Seventh Cosmos was destroyed by incursions and was brought back by Reed Richards, Franklin Richards, and the Molecule Man, and this is merely the continuation), there was naturally a sixth incarnation of the Universe. And this is the Universe that Galactu originally hailed from. 

He was born on a technologically advanced planet Taa under the name Galan. He was one of the enhanced Taa-ans and was sort of a superhero among his people. We don’t have an exact date of Galactus’ birth, so it’s difficult to establish how old he was as Galan, but unfortunately, we do know that his life was cut short because he was born during the process of destruction of his Universe. 

Black Winter came for Galan’s Universe, and it started undergoing a big crunch. It’s the process opposite of expansion and eventually results in the annihilation and rebirth of an entire universe. At the time when Galan was tasked to find the solution to their problem, much of the Universe had already died off, leaving Taa-ans a rare species in the Universe. 

Galan failed to find the solution to the crunch and basically recommended that all remaining Taa-ans commit mass suicide by flying into the central point of the Universes’ destruction, the so-called cosmic egg. 

Taa-ans, with nothing better to do, accepted the plan and rushed into the cosmic egg. All of them died, and Galan died as well, but he was approached by the Sentience of Cosmos and transformed into the Galactus, the World Devourer. 

Now recent Galactus storylines truly challenge this origin story since one of the cosmic entities under the name Black Winter credits itself with Galactus’ creation. Black Winter disintegrates everything that it comes in contact with through eldritch frost and snow, which is why Galan’s Universe was destroyed. Black Winter claimed that Galactus was originally its Herald, but he went rouge after some time. 

So there’s that no matter whether you believe that Sentience of Universe created Galactus or Black Winter, the fact still stands that Galactus was born on Taa outside our Universe. 

Galactus is billions of years old and is older than the concept of time and space in our Universe 

Now since Galactus came from the sixth Incarnation of the Universe, it’s only logical that he is older than the current time, current space, current gravity, and the current Universe as a whole.

Galactus is older than some fundamental forces of nature and some celestial phenomena that spawned simultaneously as the current Incarnation of the Universe. We don’t have Galan’s birthdate or Galactus’ birthdate but consider that no matter how old the current version of the Universe is, Galactus is far older than that. 

Is Galactus older than Celestials?

Galactus is not older than the Celestials. Celestials were created by First Firmament out of loneliness and are considered to be the older races in the Multiverse.

The chaos that Celestials caused on the Universal scale eventually created the Multiverse. Even though Galactus might be older than some Celestials, he is not older than the race. The race as a whole predates all incarnations of the Universe since they are from the first Incarnation. 

As you can see by the different creators, no matter how many times Galactus is compared and confused with Celestials (mostly due to their sizes), he is not a Celestial and never has been one. 

Who is older than Galactus? 

Even though Galactus predates the current Universe, there are several entities and cosmic beings that are older than Galactus. Of course, the being or the entity in question needs to be on a multiversal scale in order to predate the current Universe. 

Galactus’ alleged creator Black Winter is older than Galactus. Black Winter had already destroyed several Universes before the entity set its sights on the sixth Incarnation.

Multiversal Eternity (not to be confused with Eternity) is also older than Galactus. Beings from outside the Universe, such as The Beyonders, have the potential to be older than Galactus since they are not bound to our incarnations. Celestials are older than Galactus; ultimately, The One Above All and The One Below All are older than Galactus and are technically older than all of the above-mentioned entities. 

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