← Back to dex
Uncommon star 27 EP

HD 50849

RA 103.5844° · Dec -14.2428° · star

Loading sky survey…
🌌 View in 3D star map
Tonight’s visibility

Computing the sky for your location…

Score breakdown

· 3 badges
27 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Supergiant +18
  • Hot blue B-type star +6
  • Star +3
Total score 27

7 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Hot blue B-type star · +6
  • Supergiant · +18

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads B8/B9Ib — a blue-white B-type star, with a surface tens of thousands of degrees hot and a life measured in tens of millions of years.

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 9.2 you'll want a small backyard telescope, over in Canis Major.
  • Southern sky. It rides the southern half of the sky — an easier target the further south you are.
  • 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. ≈ 12.4 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
  • Fastest probe ever. ≈ 1.1 million years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.

Properties

absmag
2.478
bv
0
constellation
CMa
dist ly
704.4405
luminosity
8.8879
mag
9.15
name
HD 50849
spect
B8/B9Ib

About HD 50849

HD 50849 is an uncommon star. It lies about 704.4 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation CMa, shines at apparent magnitude 9.15 and has spectral type B8/B9Ib.

Its spectrum reads B8/B9Ib — a blue-white B-type star, with a surface tens of thousands of degrees hot and a life measured in tens of millions of years.

How to see it

Look for HD 50849 in the constellation CMa. At apparent magnitude 9.15, a small backyard telescope will bring it into view.

Like any astronomical target, HD 50849 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 50849 is an uncommon star

HD 50849 scores 27 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 7 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 3 science badges — Star, Hot blue B-type star and Supergiant — 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.