Take and write . Integrating gives the Schwarzschild tortoise coordinate
The advanced and retarded Eddington-Finkelstein coordinates are respectively and . Substituting or gives
Both radial-time blocks have determinant and smooth coefficients at . Consequently the Schwarzschild event horizon is a coordinate singularity of the original chart, not a degeneracy of the geometry. The Kretschmann scalar is finite there, while it diverges at . Angular coordinate degeneracies at the polar axes are removed separately by ordinary sphere charts.
The ingoing Eddington-Finkelstein coordinates extend the right exterior through its future black hole horizon. Radial null geodesics obey either or . Inside , the latter also moves towards smaller as increases, and the future-directed ingoing family has decreasing . Thus neither family can escape to the exterior. The future horizon is the boundary separating points that can send signals to future null infinity from those that cannot. The retarded chart extends through the past horizon instead. Reversing the time orientation gives the white hole: future-directed signals can leave it, but exterior signals cannot enter it. These are distinct branches in the eternal extension; the white-hole branch need not occur in a spacetime formed by collapse.
For a simultaneous extension through both branches, start in the right exterior and define the Kruskal–Szekeres coordinates
Their product and the extended metric are
Indeed and transform into the displayed expression. The function of on the right of the product relation has derivative , nonzero at , so is a smooth function of across zero. The coefficient of there is , finite and nonzero. Allowing either sign of therefore gives the regular maximal extension with and .
With and , the radial metric is a positive multiple of . The two exterior regions have and . The future interior, or black hole region, has ; the past interior, or white hole region, has . The Killing horizons are and , meeting on the bifurcation surface at .
For the Penrose diagram, compactify the null variables before forming time and space:
This Schwarzschild conformal compactification preserves radial null directions because . The ranges bound the diagram, and cuts off its future and past tips. On with , , so the future curvature singularity is . The past curvature singularity is similarly . Both have and are spacelike. The horizon lines remain .
Figure 1.
Penrose diagram of maximally extended Schwarzschild spacetime, with two exteriors, black and white hole interiors, horizons and conformal infinities
. Details.
Each point of this radial Penrose diagram represents a two-sphere, except at limiting boundaries. Each exterior has its own future and past null infinity, and . For example in the right exterior, at fixed gives , whereas at fixed gives . Its spacelike infinity is ; its future and past timelike infinity are the vertices and . The left exterior has the reflected counterparts. These conformal boundary points are ideal endpoints, not finite-distance spacetime events; the physical affine or proper parameters of escaping geodesics diverge.
The horizons are regular null surfaces, while the horizontal boundaries are genuine curvature singularities. The central point represents the regular bifurcation surface, not a singularity. Future-directed radial causal curves have nondecreasing , so a curve cannot go from one exterior to the other: changing the requisite signs would require one null variable to decrease. Crossing a future horizon instead leads towards the future singularity. The maximal extension has two causally disconnected exteriors, a future black-hole region and a past white-hole region.
Start with the four-dimensional Minkowski metric , where . Choose an arbitrary length , and use the retarded and advanced null coordinates , . For the Minkowski conformal compactification, set
Both lie between and . Since , we have ; the remaining inequalities are . Moreover,
Multiply by the square of the conformal factor . The resulting metric is regular on the appropriate boundary pieces and preserves the null directions. Suppressing the angular two-spheres gives a triangular Penrose diagram with radial null geodesics at degrees.
The line is the ordinary timelike centre . The upper sloping edge is future null infinity, reached with and finite ; the lower sloping edge is past null infinity, reached with and finite . The vertices and are future and past timelike infinity, denoted and . The vertex is spacelike infinity, . These are limiting endpoints in the conformal completion, rather than ordinary physical events. In particular, finite diagram coordinates at null infinity do not imply finite physical affine parameter.
The four-dimensional radial diagram is the triangle , . If one instead draws two-dimensional Minkowski spacetime with a signed Cartesian spatial coordinate, the diagram is the full diamond. The centre is a boundary of the radial quotient, not a boundary of the physical four-dimensional Minkowski spacetime.
Figure 1.
Kruskal extension and the radial Minkowski Penrose diagram
. Details.
For the Kruskal–Szekeres coordinates of a positive-mass Schwarzschild spacetime, . The displayed conformal compactification makes radial null geodesics lines of slope . The Killing horizons are , and the spacelike curvature singularities lie at , with . Two asymptotically flat exterior regions each have past null infinity, null infinity to the future, timelike infinity and spacelike infinity. The two exterior regions cannot communicate by any causal curve; future-directed curves that cross a future horizon instead end at the black-hole singularity.
Timelike infinity 2026-10-06
Future and past timelike infinity are ideal endpoints of asymptotically escaping timelike trajectories in a conformal completion. For the Minkowski conformal compactification, they are the vertices and ; these vertices are not physical spacetime events.