← Back to dex
Common star 19 EP

HD 57543

RA 110.3087° · Dec -12.9331° · star

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

Computing the sky for your location…

Score breakdown

· 4 badges
19 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • White A-type star +5
  • Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) +5
  • Star +3
Total score 19

3 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) · +5

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A1IV/V — an A-type star: white-hot, typically about twice the Sun's mass, and the class most of the sky's famous bright stars belong to.
  • Where it is in life. It is a subgiant, caught in the act of leaving the main sequence as the hydrogen in its core runs out.

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 8.7 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, 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. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 26.3 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
0.392
bv
0.088
constellation
CMa
dist ly
1496.1285
luminosity
60.7016
mag
8.7
name
HD 57543
spect
A1IV/V

About HD 57543

HD 57543 is a common star. It lies about 1,496.1 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation CMa, shines at apparent magnitude 8.7 and has spectral type A1IV/V.

Its spectrum reads A1IV/V — an A-type star: white-hot, typically about twice the Sun's mass, and the class most of the sky's famous bright stars belong to.

How to see it

Look for HD 57543 in the constellation CMa. At apparent magnitude 8.7, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 57543 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 57543 is a common star

HD 57543 scores 19 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 3 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), White A-type star and Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) — 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.