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Future

500,000,000 years from now

The Sun's increasing luminosity begins to disrupt the carbonate–silicate cycle; higher luminosity increases weathering of surface rocks, which traps carbon dioxide in the ground as carbonate. As water evaporates from the Earth's surface, rocks harden, causing plate tectonics to slow and eventually stop once the oceans evaporate completely. With less volcanism to recycle carbon into the Earth's atmosphere, carbon dioxide levels begin to fall. By this time, carbon dioxide levels will fall to the point at which C3 photosynthesis is no longer possible. All plants that use C3 photosynthesis (roughly 99 percent of present-day species) will die. The extinction of C3 plant life is likely to be a long-term decline rather than a sharp drop. It is likely that plant groups will die one by one well before the critical carbon dioxide level is reached. The first plants to disappear will be C3 herbaceous plants, followed by deciduous forests, evergreen broad-leaf forests, and finally evergreen conifers.

As Earth begins to warm and carbon dioxide levels fall, plants—and, by extension, animals—could survive longer by evolving other strategies such as requiring less carbon dioxide for photosynthetic processes, becoming carnivorous, adapting to desiccation, or associating with fungi. These adaptations are likely to appear near the beginning of the moist greenhouse. The decrease in plant life will result in less oxygen in the atmosphere, allowing for more DNA-damaging ultraviolet radiation to reach the surface. The rising temperatures will increase chemical reactions in the atmosphere, further lowering oxygen levels. Plant and animal communities become increasingly sparse and isolated as the Earth becomes more barren. Flying animals would be better off because of their ability to travel large distances looking for cooler temperatures. Many animals may be driven to the poles or possibly underground. These creatures would become active during the polar night and aestivate during the polar day due to the intense heat and radiation. Much of the land would become a barren desert, and plants and animals would primarily be found in the oceans.

This is the earliest time for plate tectonics to eventually stop, due to the gradual cooling of the Earth's core, which could potentially turn the Earth back into a water world. This would, in turn, likely cause the extinction of Earth's remaining land life.

1,000,000,000,years from now

The Sun's luminosity will have increased by 10%, causing Earth's surface temperatures to reach an average of around 116 °F. The atmosphere will become a "moist greenhouse", resulting in a runaway evaporation of the oceans. This would cause plate tectonics to stop completely, if not already stopped before this time. Pockets of water may still be present at the poles, allowing abodes for simple life.

Assuming some form of photosynthesis is possible despite extremely low carbon dioxide levels. If this is possible, rising temperatures will make any animal life unsustainable from this point on.

Eukaryotic life dies out on Earth due to carbon dioxide starvation. Only prokaryotes remain.

3,500,000,000 years from now

the Sun's luminosity will have increased by 35–40%, causing all water currently present in lakes and oceans to evaporate, if it had not done so earlier. The greenhouse effect caused by the massive, water-rich atmosphere will result in Earth's surface temperature rising to 2,060 °F, which is hot enough to melt some surface rock

7,500,000,000 years from now

The Earth and Moon are very likely destroyed by falling into the Sun, just before the Sun reaches the top of its red giant phase. Before the final collision, the Moon possibly spirals below Earth's Roche limit, breaking into a ring of debris, most of which falls to the Earth's surface.

Trillions of years from now

The Big Freeze, or Heat Death, is the most probable outcome based on current cosmological data, which supports a universe expanding forever at an accelerating rate. This scenario is governed by the second law of thermodynamics, stating that the entropy, or disorder, of an isolated system must increase over time. The universe will eventually reach a state of maximum entropy where all energy is uniformly distributed, making it impossible to perform work or sustain organized structures.

The timeline for this end is vast. Within 100 trillion years, the gas clouds required for star formation will be exhausted, ending the “Stelliferous Era” and leaving the cosmos progressively darker. As expansion continues, distant galaxies will recede so quickly that their light will no longer reach us, isolating the remnants of our own Milky Way.

The final stage involves the decay of all remaining matter. Even black holes will eventually evaporate over immense timescales. This process involves the slow emission of particles until the black hole vanishes. All that will remain is a thin, cold soup of fundamental particles, such as photons and leptons, spread across a nearly infinite, dark expanse, with the temperature approaching absolute zero.