We use cookies to deliver essential features and to measure their performance. Learn more.
Home
Search Objects
Major Solar System Objects
Comets
Asteroids
Spacecrafts
Star Maps
Orbits
public  Greenwich, UK Greenwich, UK  ⓘ
TimezoneEurope/London
Sunrise: 7:53 
Transit: 11:52 
Sunset: 15:50
sleep   (Nighttime)  
What's Visible Now • Tonight Timeline
Search  close
All Constellations »  Leo »  Deep Sky Objects » 

Messier 96 - Spiral Galaxy in Leo

Above the horizon.  Rise: 22:36 | Tran: 5:38 | Set: 12:36
Alt: 37.63°   Az: 123.91°   Direction: South-East

Messier 96 is a Spiral Galaxy in the Leo constellation. Messier 96 is situated close to the celestial equator and, as such, it is at least partly visible from both hemispheres in certain times of the year. Given its visual magnitude of 9.25, Messier 96 is visible with the help of a binocular with a 60-70mm aperture or a small telescope.

The image below is a photograph of Messier 96 from the Digitized Sky Survey 2 (DSS2 - see the credits section) taken in the red channel. The area of sky represented in the image is 0.5000x0.5000 degrees (30.00x30.00 arcmins).

Image of Messier 96 - Spiral Galaxy in Leo star
/>
DSS2 image of Messier 96 in the Red band. The green region on the image is a representation of the major (8.26 arcmin) and minor (5.51 arcmin) axes of the object's apparent size.

Celestial Coordinates

Apparent

10h 48m 04s
+11° 41’ 16”
21h 11m 21s
07h 59m 26s

J2000

10h 46m 45s
+11° 49’ 11”

Finder Chart

The simplified sky charts below show the position of Messier 96 in the sky. The first chart has a field of view of 60° while the second one has a field of view of 10°.

loader
  Loading map...
Finder chart for Messier 96 - Spiral Galaxy in Leo.

loader
  Loading map...
Finder chart for Messier 96 - Spiral Galaxy in Leo.

Photometric Information

The following table lists the magnitude of Messier 96 in different bands of the electomagnetic spectrum (when available), from the B band (445nm wavelength, corresponding to the Blue color), to the V band ( 551nm wavelength, corresponding to Green/Yellow color), to the J, H, K bands (corresponding to 1220nm, 1630nm, 2190nm wavelengths respectively, which are colors not visible to the human eye).

10.15
9.25
7.24
6.57
6.32

For more information about photometry in astronomy, check the photometric system article on Wikipedia.

The surface brightess reported below is an indication of the brightness per unit of angular area of Messier 96.

23.14 mag/arcsec2

Apparent Size

The following table reports Messier 96 apparent angular size. The green area displayed on top of the DSS2 image of Messier 96 is a visual representation of it.
8.26 arcmin
5.51 arcmin

Morphological Classification

Messier 96 - Spiral Galaxy in Leo is classified as Spiral (SAab) according to the Hubble and de Vaucouleurs galaxy morphological classification. The diagram below shows a visual representation of the position of Messier 96 - Spiral Galaxy in Leo in the Hubble de Vaucouleurs sequence.

Messier 96 - Spiral Galaxy in Leo
Visualization of the morphological classification of Messier 96 - Spiral Galaxy in Leo, Spiral (SAab).
Credits for the background image: Antonio Ciccolella / M. De Leo / CC BY

Rise and Set Times

Location: Greenwich, UK
Latitude: 51° 28’ 47” N
Longitude: 0° 00’ 00” E
Timezone: Europe/London

Today's Messier 96 - Spiral Galaxy in Leo rise, transit and set times from Greenwich, UK are the following (all times relative to the local timezone Europe/London):

Azimuth: 78.3°
Max altitude: 50.2°
Azimuth: 281.7°