Watch: How many alien races are in Star Trek?

Many fans want to know about the alien races in Star Trek

Over the last 55+ years, we’ve seen many, many alien races come and go on Star Trek. Some, like Sargon’s from the Star Trek: The Original Series episode “Return to Tomorrow,” are now extinct. Others, like the Valakians from Enterprise’s “Dear Doctor” might be headed in that direction. But how do we calculate how many races there are in the galaxy, and if we’ve just seen the tip of the iceberg, so to speak?

Tyler, a Youtuber with the channel named Orange River, regularly posts videos about fictional universes like Star Trek, and he recently posted “how many alien races are in Star Trek?” If you’re expecting him to name every one of the species that we’ve ever seen onscreen in the franchise, that’s not what he does in this video. Instead, he asks how many thousands of intelligent, spacefaring civilizations exist in the this created world, and though he calls it “rough, back-of-the-napkin math, Tyler does an excellent job of dissecting the possible number of aliens and civilizations, even those that are now extinct.

Is alien communication one of Star Trek’s biggest contrivances?

In the video, Tyler says “it’s quite curious indeed that so many Trek aliens have developed a similar enough technology at the same time in order to communicate with each other and conduct trade and diplomacy.” He calls it one of Star Trek’s biggest contrivances, but then asks if it really is as he goes on to explain why and how these aliens are on a similar level.

This really is a fascinating video filled with numerical possibilities that are nothing short of astounding. Tyler presents a clear and concise question and answers it with math. Is he 100% accurate? No, but neither are the writers when they create the alien species and leave us to wonder just how many there are in the universe. This is a good place to start for some of those answers.