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Common star 17 EP

HR 8174

RA 318.3400° · Dec 81.2310° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
17 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • White A-type star +5
  • Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) +5
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) +4
  • Star +3
Total score 17

5 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) · +4
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) · +5

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A3IV — 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 subgiant, caught in the act of leaving the main sequence as the hydrogen in its core runs out.

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 6.1 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Cepheus.
  • 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 August — 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
0.082
bv
0.092
constellation
Cep
dist ly
526.058
luminosity
80.7607
mag
6.12
name
HR 8174
spect
A3IV

About HR 8174

HR 8174 is a common star. It lies about 526.1 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cep, shines at apparent magnitude 6.12 and has spectral type A3IV.

Its spectrum reads A3IV — 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 HR 8174 in the constellation Cep. At apparent magnitude 6.12, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HR 8174 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 HR 8174 is a common star

HR 8174 scores 17 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 5 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, Never sets (northern circumpolar), White A-type star and Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) — 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.