Corona Australis
What is Corona Australis?
Constellations· Summer evenings · a small arc below Sagittarius. The southern counterpart of the Northern Crown. Six fourth-magnitude stars trace a neat arc beneath the feet of Sagittarius, next to a dark cloud where stars are still forming today. Look near the southern horizon on a summer night in the Sky view.
📍 Visible from where you are right now — computed in your browser
bearing · altitude · rise time · best time tonight
Where Corona Australis is in your sky right now: https://nowsky.org/solar/sky?sel=con:Corona Australis — location and time set automatically, no login.
Stars of the figure
| Star | Magnitude |
|---|---|
| Alfecca Meridiana | 4.1 |
| Beta Coronae Australis | 4.1 |
The 2 brightest of the 3 stars used in the figure (2 lines). Lower magnitude means brighter.
Constellation basics
| Season | Jul–Aug evenings, near the southern horizon; low from Korea |
|---|---|
| Brightest star | α (Meridiana) and β, both mag 4.1 |
| How to find | a small arc right below the Sagittarius Teapot |
| Area rank | 80th of 88 |
Figures are representative approximations. Source: compiled from NASA and IAU public data.
Frequently asked
- When can I see Corona Australis?
- Jul–Aug evenings, near the southern horizon; low from Korea.
- How do I find Corona Australis?
- a small arc right below the Sagittarius Teapot.
- What is the brightest star in Corona Australis?
- Alfecca Meridiana, magnitude 4.1.
- Where is Corona Australis in the sky right now?
- Open the sky view for your location and time and it shows the position in the sky right now.
The Coronet — a small group making stars inside the crown
Around the star R Coronae Australis lies a small cluster called the Coronet. Buried in dust, it shows only a few stars and blue reflection nebulae in visible light, but in infrared and X-rays dozens of newborn stars appear. At 430 light-years it is one of the few places where the earliest stages of star formation can be seen in detail.
Several Herbig–Haro objects, where jets from new stars strike the surrounding gas and glow, have been found in the group, and in one of them, HH 100, the knots were seen to move within a few years of observation — star formation happening now. The dark part of this small constellation that draws a semicircle below the Teapot of Sagittarius turns, in photographs, into a cradle of stars where black clouds and blue reflected light mingle.
The constellation in depth
Corona Australis is a small constellation known since Ptolemy, the partner of the Northern Crown. It has been described as a wreath dropped by the Sagittarius centaur, or the garland Dionysus raised to the sky for his mother Semele. It has no bright star, but its tidy arc is hard to forget once seen. It ranks 80th of the 88 constellations in area.
The Corona Australis molecular cloud, about 430 light-years away, is one of the nearest star-forming regions to Earth. Newborn stars glow in the infrared from inside their dust, and the reflection nebulae NGC 6726 and 6729 mark the spot. The globular cluster NGC 6541 is a good binocular object nearby. Together they make a rewarding sweep for a small telescope.
At declinations of −37° to −45° it hangs just above the southern horizon from Korea around midnight in July and August, directly beneath the Teapot of Sagittarius. In the Sky view, set Jeju or any southern-hemisphere city on an August night to see the whole arc. From the southern hemisphere it stands high on winter nights and is far easier to trace.
Related
Figures are representative approximations. Simulated positions use J2000 mean elements.