← Back to dex
Uncommon star 26 EP

69 Dra

RA 299.9028° · Dec 76.4814° · star

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

Computing the sky for your location…

Score breakdown

· 5 badges
26 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Deep red star +8
  • Giant star +6
  • Cool red M-type star +5
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) +4
  • Star +3
Total score 26

8 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) · +4
  • Cool red M-type star · +5
  • Giant star · +6
  • Deep red star · +8

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads M3III — an M-type red star — and M stars are the silent majority: roughly three of every four stars in the galaxy are one.
  • 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 6.2 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Draco.
  • Never sets. So far north that from Britain, Canada or northern Europe it never dips below the horizon — it is up every clear night of the year.
  • 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. ≈ 9.2 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
0.162
bv
1.61
constellation
Dra
dist ly
526.058
luminosity
75.024
mag
6.2
name
69 Dra
spect
M3III

About 69 Dra

69 Dra is an uncommon star. It lies about 526.1 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Dra, shines at apparent magnitude 6.2 and has spectral type M3III.

Its spectrum reads M3III — an M-type red star — and M stars are the silent majority: roughly three of every four stars in the galaxy are one.

How to see it

Look for 69 Dra in the constellation Dra. At apparent magnitude 6.2, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, 69 Dra 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 69 Dra is an uncommon star

69 Dra scores 26 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 8 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Star, Never sets (northern circumpolar), Cool red M-type star, Giant star and Deep red 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.