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Common exoplanet 16 EP

HD 48948 d

RA 102.4898° · Dec 60.3373° · exoplanet

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Score breakdown

· 3 badges
16 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Multi-planet system +6
  • Confirmed exoplanet +5
  • Sub-Neptune +5
Total score 16

6 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Confirmed exoplanet · +5
  • Sub-Neptune · +5
  • Multi-planet system · +6

Trivia

What it actually is

  • What it is made of. Too light to be solid rock and too heavy to be all gas: most likely a deep global ocean or a thick steamy envelope over a rocky core.
  • Crowded system. One of at least 3 planets orbiting its star.

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 8.6 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in.
  • 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 January — 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. ≈ 968.9 thousand years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

density gcc
1.71
diameter km
41330.088
discovery facility
Roque de los Muchachos Observatory
discovery method
Radial Velocity
discovery year
2024
dist ly
55.1344
eccentricity
0.055
eq temp k
349
host star teff
4593
insolation
2.46
mag
8.58
mass earth
10.59
name
HD 48948 d
orbital period days
151.92
radius earth
3.24
semi major au
0.4894
spect
K3 V
sys num planets
3
sys num stars
1

About HD 48948 d

HD 48948 d is a common exoplanet. It lies about 55.1 light-years from Earth, shines at apparent magnitude 8.58, has spectral type K3 V and has an equilibrium temperature near 349 K.

Too light to be solid rock and too heavy to be all gas: most likely a deep global ocean or a thick steamy envelope over a rocky core.

How to see it

At apparent magnitude 8.58, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 48948 d 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 HD 48948 d is a common exoplanet

HD 48948 d scores 16 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 6 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 3 science badges — Confirmed exoplanet, Sub-Neptune and Multi-planet system — 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.