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Star profile

Kappa Pavonis

Variable star
3D likeness based on its real data · class F · ~6,500 K

What is Kappa Pavonis

Kappa Pavonis shines some 500 light-years away in the southern Peacock constellation, and ranks among the brightest Cepheid variables of its W Virginis type —a venerable class of aged pulsating stars. Its luminosity oscillates with a measurable rhythm that decades ago turned it into a tool for calibrating distances in far reaches of space. Each pulse is the breath of a star in its final stages.

Where it is and when to see it

Kappa Pavonis lies in the southern celestial hemisphere. It is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky. Its best month of the year is June: 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

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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 Kappa Pavonis

Constellation
Pavo
Apparent magnitude
4.40
Distance
500.3 light years
Coordinates (J2000)
RA 284.238° · Dec -67.233°
Catalogue
HIP 93015 · HD 174694

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

Other stars in Pavo

Pavo has 44 stars in Stelvia's catalogue. Here are a few of them.

See all 44 stars in Pavo