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public  Greenwich, UK Greenwich, UK  ⓘ
TimezoneEurope/London
Sunrise: 4:45 
Transit: 13:02 
Sunset: 21:19
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All Constellations » Cetus » 

τ Ceti (tau Ceti)

Above the horizon.  Rise: 3:51 | Tran: 8:26 | Set: 13:01
Alt: 16.83°   Az: 146.84°   Direction: South

τ Ceti is a double main-sequence star of spectral class G8 in the constellation of Cetus.

τ Ceti visual magnitude is 3.5. Because of its moderate brightness, τ Ceti is easily visible to the naked eye from locations with dark skies, while it might be barely visible, or not visible at all, from light-polluted skies.

Image of τ Ceti (tau Ceti) star
DSS2 image of τ Ceti. The red arrow shows the motion of τ Ceti during the next 100 years (-2.86 arcmin in Right Ascension and 1.43 arcmin in declination);

Celestial Coordinates

Apparent

01h 45m 18s
-15° 48’ 36”
21h 48m 08s
23h 33m 26s

J2000

01h 44m 04s
-15° 56’ 14”

Galactic Coordinates

173.19°
-73.43°

Finder Chart

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Finder chart for τ Ceti (tau Ceti).

Magnitude, Color, Spectral Class

3.5
Main-sequence

5.69
G8V
5534K

The red dot in the diagram below shows where τ Ceti is situated in the Hertzsprung–Russell diagram.

HR Diagram
H-R diagram showing the position of τ Ceti. Attribution: Richard Powell / CC BY-SA

Star System Properties

τ Ceti is a visual double star which can be observed only with the help of very large telescopes. The table below shows key information about the τ Ceti double sysyem:

3.5
13
9.5
89.8 arcsec

Distance, Radial Speed, Proper Motion

τ Ceti is distant 11.89 light years from the Sun and it is moving towards the Sun at the speed of 16 kilometers per second.

3.65
11.89
-16 km/s
-1.718 arcsec/y
0.856"/y

Alternative Designations

τ Ceti
(tau Ceti)
SAO147986
SAO147986

Visibility from Your Location

Today's τ Ceti (tau Ceti) rise, transit and set times from Greenwich, UK are the following (all times relative to the local timezone Europe/London):

Azimuth: 105.8°
Max altitude: 22.7°
Azimuth: 254.2°