The Force is an invisible energy field that connects everything in the Star Wars galaxy. It is created by all living things, flows through them, and binds the galaxy together. A few rare individuals are born able to sense and use the Force, gaining powers that can seem almost magical. The Jedi and their enemies the Sith are the two most famous groups who study it, and their opposing beliefs about how the Force should be used have shaped the entire history of the galaxy.

As the old Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi first explained it to Luke Skywalker, the Force is what gives a Jedi power — an energy field created by all living things that surrounds and penetrates everyone and holds the galaxy together.

The Force lives in all living things, but only certain people, called Force-sensitives, can consciously feel it and learn to use it. In the films, this sensitivity is linked to tiny living things in the blood called midi-chlorians: the more a person has, the stronger their potential connection to the Force. Because droids and machines are built rather than born, they have no connection to the Force at all.

The Force is often described as having two aspects. The Living Force is the energy of all individual creatures, while the Cosmic Force is the greater power that ties the whole galaxy together and is said to express the "will of the Force." Because every life feeds into this larger whole, a powerful Force-user can feel a "disturbance in the Force" when a great many lives are suddenly lost.

The ability can run in families. Luke Skywalker and his twin sister Leia Organa both inherited a strong connection from their father, Anakin Skywalker, one of the most powerful Force-users who ever lived.

Using the Force gives a person abilities far beyond those of an ordinary being. Common powers include moving objects with the mind, sensing danger or glimpsing the future, leaping great distances, and surviving injuries that would harm anyone else. Some Jedi can even influence weak-minded people with a "mind trick," persuading them to obey a simple command.

Certain powers belong mainly to one side. The Jedi reach the light side's abilities through a calm, peaceful state of mind and use them mostly to protect and defend. The Sith draw on raw emotion — anger, fear, and hatred — to fuel darker powers such as Force lightning, blasts of energy used to harm enemies, and the Force choke, strangling a victim from a distance with a clawing gesture. The light side also offers something the dark side cannot: the ability to keep one's consciousness after death and return as a glowing Force spirit, as Obi-Wan does after Darth Vader strikes him down.

The Force has been studied for more than twenty-five thousand years, with different worlds and species developing their own names and beliefs about it. For most of that time the Jedi Order was its best-known student, devoted to selflessness and service.

Long ago, a single Jedi came to believe that true power could only be found through passion rather than calm. The Jedi Council rejected this idea and banished him, but a group of followers went into exile with him. This division grew into a long, dark period of war and gave rise to the Sith. From then on, the Force came to be seen as split in two: the Jedi's selfless path became known as the light side, and the Sith's path of emotion and violence became the dark side.

For thousands of years the Jedi and the Sith fought one another for control of the galaxy and to prove whose understanding of the Force was right. Whole worlds were ruined in their battles. Both sides wielded lightsabers powered by special Force-attuned kyber crystals, and the Sith sometimes used giant crystals to build planet-destroying superweapons.

Eventually the Sith nearly wiped themselves out through their own greed and infighting, and the Jedi emerged victorious. A thousand years of peace followed, with the Jedi serving as guardians of the Galactic Republic. But the Sith secretly survived. Their surviving lord created a new rule: there would only ever be two Sith at a time, a master and an apprentice, so that greed could never again destroy them from within. They waited in hiding for the right moment to take revenge.

There was an ancient prophecy that a "Chosen One" would one day bring balance to the Force. The Jedi believed this was Anakin Skywalker, the most powerful Force-user ever discovered. But at the height of the Clone Wars, Anakin was tempted to the dark side by the Sith lord Darth Sidious and became Darth Vader, helping to hunt the Jedi to near extinction.

Under the Galactic Empire, belief in the Force faded, and many came to dismiss it as an old superstition. Yet the prophecy was fulfilled in the end: to save his son Luke, Vader turned on Sidious and destroyed him, dying as Anakin Skywalker once more. With the Sith gone, balance was restored, and Luke remained as the last of the Jedi.

Though the prophecy promised the end of the Sith, it never promised the end of the dark side. Luke tried to rebuild the Jedi Order and trained a new group of students, including his nephew Ben Solo. But Ben was drawn to the darkness and became Kylo Ren, destroying Luke's school.

Years later, a scavenger named Rey discovered her own deep connection to the Force. A powerful bond formed between Rey and Kylo Ren, letting them see and speak to each other across great distances even when far apart — a striking example of how the Force links all living things. Their intertwined paths would decide the fate of both the light and the dark.

Many groups across the galaxy have worshipped or studied the Force in their own ways, not only the Jedi and Sith but smaller faiths like the Church of the Force and the Guardians of the Whills. Different species gave it different names — the Lasat people, for instance, called the light side the "Ashla" and saw the Force as the very spirit of the galaxy.

The idea of the Force appeared in George Lucas's earliest drafts of A New Hope, where it was called "the Force of Others" and already split into a good half and an evil half. The early names "Ashla" and "Bogan" for the light and dark sides went unused for decades before being brought back in the series Star Wars Rebels. The Force even has its own piece of music, a gentle theme by composer John Williams first heard in A New Hope as Luke gazes at the twin sunset of his home planet.

• The Force at Wookieepedia
• The Force at Wikipedia