Scorpius
What is Scorpius?
Constellations· Summer, low south (N) · S-curved tail. One of the few constellations that looks like its name. Red Antares — 'rival of Mars' — marks the heart, and the S-shaped tail sweeps the summer horizon.
📍 Visible from where you are right now — computed in your browser
bearing · altitude · rise time · best time tonight
Where Scorpius is in your sky right now: https://nowsky.org/solar/sky?sel=con:Scorpius — location and time set automatically, no login.
Stars of the figure
| Star | Magnitude |
|---|---|
| Antares | 1.1 |
| Shaula | 1.6 |
| Iota1 Scorpii | 3.0 |
The 3 brightest of the 16 stars used in the figure (15 lines). Lower magnitude means brighter.
Deep-sky objects near this constellation
Constellation basics
| Season | summer, low south |
|---|---|
| Brightest star | red Antares (1.1) |
| Shape | the S-curved tail |
Figures are representative approximations. Source: compiled from NASA and IAU public data.
Frequently asked
- When can I see Scorpius?
- summer, low south.
- What is the brightest star in Scorpius?
- Antares, magnitude 1.1.
- In one line, what is Scorpius?
- Constellations — One of the few constellations that looks like its name.
- Where is Scorpius 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 scorpion's upper body is one family — the Sco-Cen association
The bright blue stars of the scorpion's head and body did not gather by chance. Most of them, Antares included, belong to the Scorpius–Centaurus association, a group born from the same molecular cloud about 15 million years ago and still moving together. At 400 to 500 light-years it is the nearest birthplace of massive stars to the solar system, which is why Scorpius is so rich in blue stars.
The association stretches across a great arc of sky from Scorpius through Centaurus and Lupus to Crux. Being young, only a few of its members have exploded as supernovae, but those explosions are thought to have swept out the interstellar space near the Sun and created the Local Bubble we sit in. The summer scorpion is a constellation that records the recent history of our neighbourhood.
The constellation in depth
Scorpius actually looks like a scorpion — claws, body, and the S-curled tail with its stinger — glowing low in the south on summer evenings.
Its heart, Antares, is a red supergiant ~700 Suns across, named 'rival of Ares' — when Mars passes nearby, the two red lights shine side by side, a spectacle noted since antiquity.
The stinger region, near the galactic centre, teems with clusters and nebulae. From mid-northern latitudes the tail grazes the horizon — find an open southern view for the full scorpion.
Summer's scorpion has a winter rival: Orion. In myth the scorpion stung the hunter dead, so the two were placed on opposite sides of the sky, never to meet — and indeed Orion sets in the west just as Scorpius rises. Spin the sky view six months forward to watch the changing of the guard yourself.
Related
Figures are representative approximations. Simulated positions use J2000 mean elements.