← Back to dex
Uncommon star 29 EP

HD 131698

RA 223.9532° · Dec -24.2806° · star

Loading sky survey…
🌌 View in 3D star map
Tonight’s visibility

Computing the sky for your location…

Score breakdown

· 5 badges
29 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Bright giant +12
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • White A-type star +5
  • Star +3
  • On the zodiac +3
Total score 29

5 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Bright giant · +12

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A0II/III — an A-type star: white-hot, typically about twice the Sun's mass, and the class most of the sky's famous bright stars belong to.
  • Where it is in life. It is a bright giant, well on its way to the largest stars there are.

Sense of scale

  • In perspective. Far away by human standards, yet still a local address inside the Milky Way's spiral arms.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 8.1 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Libra.
  • Southern sky. It rides the southern half of the sky — an easier target the further south you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around May — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 19.9 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
0.427
bv
0.193
constellation
Lib
dist ly
1132.486
luminosity
58.776
mag
8.13
name
HD 131698
spect
A0II/III

About HD 131698

HD 131698 is an uncommon star. It lies about 1,132.5 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Lib, shines at apparent magnitude 8.13 and has spectral type A0II/III.

Its spectrum reads A0II/III — an A-type star: white-hot, typically about twice the Sun's mass, and the class most of the sky's famous bright stars belong to.

How to see it

Look for HD 131698 in the constellation Lib. At apparent magnitude 8.13, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 131698 is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.

Why HD 131698 is an uncommon star

HD 131698 scores 29 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 5 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), On the zodiac, White A-type star and Bright giant — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.