RA 49.9961° · Dec 41.4795° · openngc
11 more points to reach Epic.
NGC 1279 is a rare galaxy. It lies about 335,382,343.6 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Per and shines at apparent magnitude 17.23.
A galaxy: a gravitationally bound city of stars, gas and dark matter, turning so slowly that a single rotation takes hundreds of millions of years.
Look for NGC 1279 in the constellation Per. At apparent magnitude 17.23, it takes a larger telescope or a long-exposure image to capture.
Like any astronomical target, NGC 1279 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.
NGC 1279 scores 39 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 11 points would lift it into a rarer tier.
That score comes from 5 science badges — Galaxy, Outside our galaxy entirely, Lenticular galaxy (a disc with no arms), Ghostly low surface brightness and Faint fuzzy (mag > 13) — 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.