What is Earth's period of rotation?

Answer 1

The earth rotates 360 degrees every 23 hours, 56 minutes and 4.100352 seconds or so. See link for another estimate, given as the decimal fraction of one day. Look for sidereal rotation period.

Answer 2

The simple answer is one day. This is also 24 hours, the approximate time between noon and noon on two consecutive days. This is called the solar day. But the actual period of rotation is less, about 23 hours and 56 minutes. This is in relation to the "fixed stars" and is called a sidereal day.

A solar day is the time it takes for the Earth to rotate so that after one rotation the Sun is in exactly the same position relative to Earth. This time is split into 24 hours exactly. However, because the Earth is also orbiting the Sun as it rotates, it takes one complete revolution plus a small fraction of a revolution to complete the turn directly toward the Sun. Therefore a solar day, split into 24 hours, is slightly longer than the actual time it takes the earth to rotate on its axis.

A sidereal day is the time it takes for the Earth to rotate once with respect to the stars (which are so far away their motion is negligible). A sidereal day is regarded as the true measure of a planet's rotation time. In this case the actual period of rotation of the Earth through 360 degrees takes 0.99727 solar days or 23 hours 56 minutes 4.09053 seconds.

Answer 3

earths period of rotation is 365 days a year.