About NGTS-12 b
NGTS-12 b is a rare exoplanet. It lies about 1,456.1 light-years from Earth, has an equilibrium temperature near 1,257 K, spans roughly 11.75 Earth radii and weighs about 66.11 Earth masses.
So low-density it would float on water.
Rare exoplanet 41 EP
NGTS-12 b
RA 176.2499° · Dec -35.6406° · exoplanet
Score breakdown
· 5 badgesRare 46 pts → Epic
- Puffy low-density world +12
- Hot Jupiter +10
- Distant (>1000 ly) +10
- Confirmed exoplanet +5
- Gas giant +4
Total score 41
5 more points to reach Epic.
Badges
- Confirmed exoplanet · +5
- Gas giant · +4
- Hot Jupiter · +10
- Puffy low-density world · +12
- Distant (>1000 ly) · +10
Trivia
What makes it special
- Cotton-candy planet. So low-density it would float on water.
Could we get there?
- Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.
Getting there
- Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 25.6 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
- Fastest probe ever. ≈ 2.3 million years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.
- At 10% light speed. ≈ 14.6 thousand years in a starship at a tenth of light speed.
- Distance. 1456 light-years from Earth.
Look-back time
- Look-back time. The light you'd see left around the year 570.
Saying hello
- Say hello. A radio message and its reply would take 2912 years round-trip.
Standing on it
- A year here. A full year lasts just 7.5 Earth days.
By the numbers
- Size. About 11.7× the width of Earth.
- Volume. About 1621 Earths could fit inside it.
- Mass. Roughly 66.1× Earth's mass — about 0.2 Jupiters.
- Your weight. You'd weigh about 0.5× your Earth weight standing here.
- Density. Less dense than water — drop it in a big enough ocean and it would float.
- Temperature. Around 984°C — hotter than a self-cleaning oven.
How we found it
- Discovery. Found by Next-Generation Transit Survey (NGTS) using the transit method.
Properties
- density gcc
- 0.223
- discovery facility
- Next-Generation Transit Survey (NGTS)
- discovery method
- Transit
- dist ly
- 1456.0974
- eccentricity
- 0
- eq temp k
- 1257
- insolation
- 416
- mass earth
- 66.1086
- name
- NGTS-12 b
- orbital period days
- 7.5328
- radius earth
- 11.747
- sys num planets
- 1
How to see it
Like any astronomical target, NGTS-12 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-12 b is a rare exoplanet
NGTS-12 b scores 41 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 5 points would lift it into a rarer tier.
That score comes from 5 science badges — Confirmed exoplanet, Gas giant, Hot Jupiter, Puffy low-density world and Distant (>1000 ly) — 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.