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Common star 20 EP

21Eta Cyg

RA 299.0766° · Dec 35.0834° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
20 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Giant star +6
  • Star +3
  • Orange K-type star +3
Total score 20

2 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Orange K-type star · +3
  • Giant star · +6

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads K0IIIvar — a K-type star. Orange K dwarfs are the marathon runners of the galaxy, burning steadily for tens of billions of years.
  • Where it is in life. It is a giant. It has already exhausted its core hydrogen and swollen up enormously in response.

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 3.9 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Cygnus.
  • Northern sky. It rides the northern half of the sky — an easier target the further north you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around July — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Hopelessly far for any craft humanity can build today.

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 2.4 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
0.806
bv
1.019
constellation
Cyg
dist ly
134.9425
luminosity
41.4572
mag
3.89
name
21Eta Cyg
spect
K0IIIvar

About 21Eta Cyg

21Eta Cyg is a common star. It lies about 134.9 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cyg, shines at apparent magnitude 3.89 and has spectral type K0IIIvar.

Its spectrum reads K0IIIvar — a K-type star. Orange K dwarfs are the marathon runners of the galaxy, burning steadily for tens of billions of years.

How to see it

Look for 21Eta Cyg in the constellation Cyg. At apparent magnitude 3.89, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, 21Eta Cyg 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 21Eta Cyg is a common star

21Eta Cyg scores 20 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 2 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, Naked-eye visible, Orange K-type star and Giant star — 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.