RA 206.8853° · Dec 49.3133° · star
14 more points to reach Epic.
Alkaid is a rare star. It lies about 103.9 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation UMa, shines at apparent magnitude 1.85 and has spectral type B3V SB.
Its spectrum reads B3V SB — 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.
Look for Alkaid in the constellation UMa. At apparent magnitude 1.85, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.
Like any astronomical target, Alkaid 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.
Alkaid scores 36 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 14 points would lift it into a rarer tier.
That score comes from 7 science badges — Star, Naked-eye visible, Has a proper name, Never sets (northern circumpolar), Hot blue B-type star, Main-sequence star and Blue-white star — 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.