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Rare exoplanet 37 EP

NGTS-5 b

RA 221.0583° · Dec 5.6054° · exoplanet

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
37 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Puffy low-density world +12
  • Tidally locked +10
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Confirmed exoplanet +5
  • Gas giant +4
Total score 37

13 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Confirmed exoplanet · +5
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Gas giant · +4
  • Tidally locked · +10
  • Puffy low-density world · +12

Trivia

Hard to believe

  • It would float. It is less dense than water. Drop it in a big enough ocean and the whole world would bob on the surface.

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. Lighter than Neptune — a puffed-up ball of hydrogen and helium with no surface anywhere on it to stand on.

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 13.8 it is far too faint for the eye: this one belongs to cameras and long exposures.
  • Seen from everywhere. It sits almost on the celestial equator, so it can be seen from essentially anywhere on Earth.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around May — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Properties

density gcc
0.194
diameter km
162430.1032
discovery facility
Next-Generation Transit Survey (NGTS)
discovery method
Transit
discovery year
2019
dist ly
1000.5781
eccentricity
0
eq temp k
952
host star teff
4987
inclination
86.6
insolation
101.253
mag
13.789
mass earth
72.7831
name
NGTS-5 b
orbital period days
3.357
radius earth
12.7334
semi major au
0.0382
spect
K2 V
sys num planets
1
sys num stars
1
tidally locked
yes
tidally locked inferred
yes

About NGTS-5 b

NGTS-5 b is a rare exoplanet. It lies about 1,000.6 light-years from Earth, shines at apparent magnitude 13.79, has spectral type K2 V and has an equilibrium temperature near 952 K.

It orbits closer to its star than Mercury does to the Sun, completing a lap in less time than Mercury takes.

How to see it

At apparent magnitude 13.79, it takes a larger telescope or a long-exposure image to capture.

Like any astronomical target, NGTS-5 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 NGTS-5 b is a rare exoplanet

NGTS-5 b scores 37 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 13 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Confirmed exoplanet, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Gas giant, Tidally locked and Puffy low-density world — 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.