- 5 Oct in London, Saturn: visible all night. In the south, 40° up, around 00:50. Magnitude 0.2, in Cetus.
- Saturn is in the evening sky 5 Oct – 16 Mar, and in the morning sky 5 Oct – 8 Oct, 6 Jun – 4 Oct. Brightest on 4 Oct (−0.0), closest to the Earth on 4 Oct, 1,250 million km.
- Saturn behind the Sun: 7 April 2027.
Tonight in London
| Rises | 18:34 |
| Sets | 06:59 |
| Best | Visible all night |
| Where to look | In the south, 40° up, around 00:50 |
| Constellation | Cetus |
How to find it
To the eye Saturn is a yellowish, steady point, about as bright as the brightest stars. It takes 29.5 years to go around the Sun, so it moves slowly among the stars and stays a couple of years in each constellation. Opposition comes every 54 weeks.
The nearest bright signpost now is Diphda: Saturn is 20° from it, a few binocular fields away. Light takes 70 minutes to reach the Earth from the planet now.
When it shows over the next 12 months
Saturn is in the evening sky 5 Oct – 16 Mar, and in the morning sky 5 Oct – 8 Oct, 6 Jun – 4 Oct. Brightest on 4 Oct (−0.0), closest to the Earth on 4 Oct, 1,250 million km.
Month by month
On the 15th of each month: when the planet rises and sets, its brightness, constellation and distance from the Earth.
| Date | Rises | Sets | Magnitude | Constellation | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15 Oct | 17:54 | 06:15 | 0.3 | Cetus | 1,265 million km |
| 15 Nov | 14:48 | 03:03 | 0.5 | Cetus | 1,301 million km |
| 15 Dec | 12:49 | 01:02 | 0.7 | Cetus | 1,365 million km |
| 15 Jan | 10:44 | 23:07 | 0.7 | Cetus | 1,441 million km |
| 15 Feb | 08:46 | 21:20 | 0.7 | Cetus | 1,506 million km |
| 15 Mar | 07:01 | 19:48 | 0.6 | Pisces | 1,543 million km |
| 15 Apr | 06:06 | 19:08 | 0.5 | Pisces | 1,551 million km |
| 15 May | 04:14 | 17:30 | 0.5 | Pisces | 1,526 million km |
| 15 Jun | 02:19 | 15:45 | 0.5 | Pisces | 1,472 million km |
| 15 Jul | 00:25 | 13:58 | 0.4 | Pisces | 1,401 million km |
| 15 Aug | 22:25 | 11:55 | 0.3 | Pisces | 1,326 million km |
| 15 Sep | 20:22 | 09:46 | 0.1 | Pisces | 1,269 million km |
Key dates
The outer planets are best at opposition, when the Earth is between them and the Sun, and hidden for a few weeks around conjunction with the Sun.
| Date | Event | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| 7 April 2027 | Saturn behind the Sun | Conjunction with the Sun: hidden for a few weeks either side. |
| 18 October 2027 | Saturn at opposition | Closest and brightest of the year, rises at sunset and is up all night. |
| 20 April 2028 | Saturn behind the Sun | Conjunction with the Sun: hidden for a few weeks either side. |
How the rings will open
The tilt of the rings towards the Earth on 1 October each year: at 0° the rings are edge-on and almost vanish (as in 2025), at about 27° they are open widest.
The Moon next to the planet
Every month the Moon passes Saturn, the easiest way to find the planet. The next close passes:
| Sat 24 Oct | 6.1° |
| Fri 20 Nov | 6.1° |
Where the planet is in the Solar System
The view from above: the Sun in the centre, orbits scaled down. Today Saturn is 1,262 million km from the Earth; over the year the distance ranges from 1,250 million km to 1,553 million km.
What kind of planet
Saturn is the second largest planet and the least dense of all: its average density is lower than water's. The rings are made of chunks of ice and rock from dust grains to the size of a house, nearly 280,000 km across but in most places only tens of metres thick. Saturn has more than 270 moons; the largest, Titan, is bigger than Mercury, with a thick atmosphere and lakes of methane, and jets of water shoot from the icy surface of Enceladus.
In binoculars
In 10× binoculars Saturn looks elongated: you will not split the rings yet, but you can see it is not round. Titan sometimes shows nearby as a faint point a few planet-widths away.
In a telescope
The rings show in any telescope at about 25–30× and, for many people, are the most memorable first look through a telescope. From 100× in a 100 mm or larger telescope you can see the Cassini Division, a dark gap in the rings, the rings' shadow on the planet and several moons. About every 15 years the Earth passes through the ring plane and the rings almost vanish for a while; that happened in 2025, and the rings are now opening again.
Exploration
Pioneer 11 (1979) and both Voyagers (1980–1981) flew past Saturn. The NASA–European Cassini–Huygens mission orbited from 2004 to 2017: Huygens landed on Titan in 2005, the most distant landing in the Solar System, and Cassini discovered the water jets of Enceladus before ending its mission in September 2017 by diving into Saturn's atmosphere. Next comes NASA's Dragonfly, a rotorcraft meant to fly over Titan's surface.
Name and history
The planet is named after Saturn, the Roman god of farming and time (the Greek Cronus). In antiquity it was the most distant planet known. In 1610 Galileo saw strange "ears" beside Saturn without understanding them, and in 1655 Christiaan Huygens explained that the planet is circled by a thin flat ring, and discovered Titan.
Facts
| Diameter | 116,460 km |
| Year | 29.4 Earth years |
| Day | 10 h 33 min |
| Moons | more than 270 |
| Density | 0.69 g/cm³, less than water |
| Ring span | about 280,000 km |
Other planets
Questions people ask
Can I see Saturn tonight?
In London: visible all night. In the south, 40° up, around 00:50.
When is Saturn in the evening sky?
Over the next 12 months: 5 Oct – 16 Mar.
When is Saturn in the morning sky?
Over the next 12 months: 5 Oct – 8 Oct, 6 Jun – 4 Oct.
When is Saturn at opposition?
18 Oct 2027: closest and brightest of the year, rises at sunset and is up all night.
How do I tell Saturn from a star?
Planets do not twinkle and shine steadily, while stars twinkle, especially near the horizon. Planets also shift against the stars over a few weeks.
How far away is Saturn?
Today, 1,262 million km. Over the coming year it is closest on 4 Oct (1,250 million km).
Would Saturn float in water?
Its average density (0.69 g/cm³) is lower than water's, so in theory, yes. There is no bathtub that big, of course, and a planet with no solid surface would simply mix with the water.
Are the rings permanent?
No. Ring particles slowly fall into Saturn, and over a hundred million years the rings could shrink a lot. How long ago they formed is still debated.
- Astronomy Engine (Don Cross): planet positions, brightness, conjunctions, oppositions and elongations from VSOP87.
- NASA Planetary Fact Sheets: physical data of the planets.
- NOAA solar calculator equations: twilight times.
Visibility is checked for every day half an hour after evening civil twilight ends and half an hour before morning twilight begins: the planet counts as visible if it is more than 5° above the horizon then.