Star profile
Rigel
Beta Orionis · Orion
Hot blue starWhat is Rigel
Rigel blazes as a blue supergiant at Orion's foot, one of the brightest beacons of the winter sky. Its searing white light travels 863 years to reach us: what shines tonight above the horizon left the star when medieval cathedrals were still rising stone by stone across Europe. The name comes from the Arabic «riǧl al-jabbār», 'the foot of the giant', preserved by the astronomers who mapped Orion the hunter centuries ago.
Where it is and when to see it
Rigel lies in the southern celestial hemisphere. It is one of the brightest stars in the sky: visible even from a city. Its best month of the year is December: 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.
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The signature wall
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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
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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 Rigel
- Constellation
- Orion
- Apparent magnitude
- 0.18
- Distance
- 863.0 light years
- Coordinates (J2000)
- RA 78.634° · Dec -8.202°
- Catalogue
- HIP 24436 · HD 34085
A symbolic commemorative gift: neither the signature nor the chosen name implies ownership of the star or recognition by the IAU.
Other stars in Orion
Orion has 128 stars in Stelvia's catalogue. Here are a few of them.
- BetelgeuseAlpha Orionis0.45
- BellatrixGamma Orionis1.64
- AlnilamEpsilon Orionis1.69
- AlnitakZeta Orionis1.74
- SaiphKappa Orionis2.07
- MintakaDelta Orionis2.25
- HatysaIota Orionis2.75
- TabitPi 3 Orionis3.19