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Star profile

Lambda Cepheus

Hot blue star
3D likeness based on its real data · class O · ~30,000 K

What is Lambda Cepheus

Lambda Cephei is a blue O-type supergiant, one of the hottest and most luminous stars visible to the naked eye, set almost two thousand light-years away. It is also a famous runaway, ejected from its parent association and now ploughing through the interstellar medium so fast that its stellar wind compresses the surrounding gas into a bow shock. It lives in a hurry and will die young, in a supernova explosion.

Where it is and when to see it

Lambda Cepheus lies in the northern celestial hemisphere. It is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky. Its best month of the year is October: the Sun sits at the opposite point of the sky and the star culminates around midnight. How high it climbs above the horizon depends on the latitude you watch from.

Find it on the sky map

It opens in your browser. Free, no account, nothing to install.

The signature wall

Stelvia's sky works like a signature wall: anyone can leave their name and a message on a real star, and that signature goes up on the map for everyone to read. Signing is free.

A signature without a lock can be replaced by someone else's. The lock makes the signature permanent and lets you choose a symbolic name for the star, always shown next to the star's catalogue identifier. How the lock works

If you don't have an account yet, we'll ask for an email to confirm it's you: we send you a link and that's it, no password.

A public signature from a real person. The chosen name is a symbolic denomination within Stelvia, with no official standing or IAU recognition: the sky is not for sale and belongs to no one.

Astronomical data for Lambda Cepheus

Constellation
Cepheus
Apparent magnitude
5.05
Distance
1977.0 light years
Coordinates (J2000)
RA 332.877° · Dec 59.414°
Catalogue
HIP 109556 · HD 210839

A symbolic commemorative gift: neither the signature nor the chosen name implies ownership of the star or recognition by the IAU.

Other stars in Cepheus

Cepheus has 95 stars in Stelvia's catalogue. Here are a few of them.

See all 95 stars in Cepheus