If you think the air we breathe these days is just nitrogen & oxygen you might find this list of ten things we breathe in every day as a bit of a shock! From water vapour to all sorts of gases and even ammonia! This list doesn’t name all of the things we breathe in, it just names the most prominent…

10 – Xenon (Volume: 0.0000087%)

Xenon is not really toxic but some of its main compounds are. It’s rare colourless and apparently a very heavy gas.

9 – Hydrogen (Volume: 0.00005%)

While we are still talking about tiny amounts hydrogen H2H2 could (in theory anyway) be ripped straight out of the sky itself! But it would cost far too much to do so due to the small amounts we are talking about.

8 – Krypton (Volume: 0.000114%)

Often used in lighting and photography krypton plasma is a gas that has more uses than you could ever think was possible,

7 – Methane (Volume: 0.0002%)

Every year we are getting more and more Methane with each passing breath. Why? Because it is one of the most potent greenhouse gases in Earth’s atmosphere.

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6 – Helium (Volume: 0.000524%)

There is nowhere near enough to make all our voices go squeaky, but regardless it is the same thing!

5 – Neon (Volume: 0.001818%)

It might be primarily used to light up glass tubes in advertising displays, but it is also one of the main elements in the very air we breathe.

4 – Carbon Dioxide (Volume: 0.01%)

While only 400 parts per million of the atmosphere it is still a part of the greenhouse gas effect and is all around us (more and more every year).

3 – Argon (Volume: 0.934%)

The first hint of argon’s existence came in 1785 when British scientist Henry Cavendish reported a seemingly inert portion of it in the air and at the time was a total mystery!

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2 – Oxygen (Volume: 20.953%)

Oxygen is just about everywhere. In the air, our blood, teeth and even our bones! But it is not just handy for breathing, it is also used in the production of steel, plastics and textiles to name just one of its thousands of uses.

1 – Nitrogen (Volume:78.110%)

Nitrogen is believed to be the seventh most abundant element in the universe and it wasn’t until the eighteenth century that scientists recognised that it was a component of air that did not support combustion.