Aquarius

What is Aquarius?

Constellations· Autumn evenings (N) · north of Fomalhaut, the Y-shaped jar. The water-bearer: a large but faint constellation whose small Y of stars is the jar, with a stream of stars trickling down toward Fomalhaut. It hosts the Helix Nebula, the Saturn Nebula and the globular cluster M2.

Where Aquarius is in your sky right now: https://nowsky.org/solar/sky?sel=con:Aquarius — location and time set automatically, no login.

Stars of the figure

The 4 brightest of the 9 stars used in the figure (8 lines). Lower magnitude means brighter.

Constellation basics

Figures are representative approximations. Source: compiled from NASA and IAU public data.

Frequently asked

When can I see Aquarius?

autumn evenings, September–November.

How do I find Aquarius?

the small Y of stars between the Great Square and Fomalhaut.

What is the brightest star in Aquarius?

Sadalsuud, magnitude 2.9.

Where is Aquarius in the sky right now?

Open the sky view for your location and time and it shows the position in the sky right now.

Meteors Halley sows twice a year — the Eta Aquariids of May

Before dawn in early May a meteor shower streams from the direction of Aquarius. These are the Eta Aquariids, and the debris belongs to Halley's Comet. Returning every 76 years, Halley has strewn its orbit with dust, and Earth crosses that orbit twice a year: in May the dust becomes meteors from Aquarius, in October from Orion.

Because the radiant rises only toward dawn, the shower yields perhaps 10 to 20 an hour from Korea, but in the southern hemisphere it ranks among the year's best. The meteors strike at 66 km/s, fast enough to leave long trails and lingering glows. Halley itself cannot be seen until 2061, yet the dust along its path streaks the sky every spring and autumn.

The constellation in depth

To the Babylonians Aquarius was Ea, the god pouring water; the Greeks made him Ganymede, the youth who served as cup-bearer to Zeus. The Sun crosses these stars in February and March, the rainy season of the ancient Near East, which is why Aquarius sits with the Fishes, the Sea-goat and the Whale in a region of sky once called the Sea.

Its most famous object is the Helix Nebula, 650 light-years away and the nearest planetary nebula: the shed outer layers of a dying Sun-like star, looking like a giant eye. The constellation also holds the small Saturn Nebula and the bright globular clusters M2 and M72. Under a very dark sky the Helix can just be glimpsed in binoculars as a faint round patch about half the width of the full Moon.

On autumn evenings drop south from the Great Square of Pegasus into a wide field of faint stars; the small Y in the middle is the water jar. The stream runs down toward bright Fomalhaut in the south. Set the Sky view to an October night and turn on the deep-sky objects to see where the Helix lies.

Related

Figures are representative approximations. Simulated positions use J2000 mean elements.