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Rare exoplanet 39 EP

G 261-6 b

RA 291.0743° · Dec 75.5558° · exoplanet

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
39 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Earth-sized +16
  • Tidally locked +10
  • Orbits a red dwarf +8
  • Confirmed exoplanet +5
Total score 39

11 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Confirmed exoplanet · +5
  • Earth-sized · +16
  • Tidally locked · +10
  • Orbits a red dwarf · +8

Trivia

What makes it special

  • Earth-sized. Genuinely comparable to Earth in size. Worlds in this narrow band are the ones every next-generation telescope is being pointed at.

What it actually is

  • Hugging its star. It orbits closer to its star than Mercury does to the Sun, completing a lap in less time than Mercury takes.
  • What it is made of. Denser than Earth — a solid world of rock and iron, with no meaningful atmosphere to speak of by mass.

Sense of scale

  • In perspective. Inside our stellar backyard: every radio broadcast humanity has ever made has already swept past it.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 15.8 it is far too faint for the eye: this one belongs to cameras and long exposures.
  • 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.

Properties

density gcc
5.66
diameter km
14031.82
discovery facility
Calar Alto Observatory
discovery method
Radial Velocity
discovery year
2025
dist ly
34.6596
eccentricity
0
eq temp k
322.3
host star teff
2907
insolation
1.8
mag
15.75
mass earth
1.37
name
G 261-6 b
orbital period days
5.4536
radius earth
1.1
semi major au
0.0297
spect
M5.5 V
sys num planets
1
sys num stars
1
tidally locked
yes
tidally locked inferred
yes

About G 261-6 b

G 261-6 b is a rare exoplanet. It lies about 34.7 light-years from Earth, shines at apparent magnitude 15.75, has spectral type M5.5 V and has an equilibrium temperature near 322 K.

Genuinely comparable to Earth in size. Worlds in this narrow band are the ones every next-generation telescope is being pointed at.

How to see it

At apparent magnitude 15.75, it takes a larger telescope or a long-exposure image to capture.

Like any astronomical target, G 261-6 b 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 G 261-6 b is a rare exoplanet

G 261-6 b 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 4 science badges — Confirmed exoplanet, Earth-sized, Tidally locked and Orbits a red dwarf — 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.