Innehållsförteckning för The Astronomer’s Yearbook 2026 från BBC Sky at Night

This comprehensive stargazing guide provides all the information you need to enjoy all the wonders of the night sky throughout 2026. In-depth articles reveal everything you need to know about smart telescopes, and offer top tips from the Lead Image Processor for the James Webb Space Telescope to help with processing your own images. Plus, there's a complete guide to the kind of night-sky images you can expect from the many different types of camera out there. The Sky Guide offers detailed advice, month by month, to help you navigate the night sky. Find out the best times to see meteor showers, planetary oppositions, occultations, transits and conjunctions. Discover the delights of constellations Scorpius, Draco, Lacerta and Cassiopeia. If you like a challenge, try hunting for volcanic activity on the…

DwarfLab Dwarf III Stats: 35mm (tele) and 3.4mm (wide) aperture, 737mm and 45mm equivalent focal lengths, Sony IMX678 STARVIS 2 sensor Size: An ultra-portable 222 x 142 x 65mm, 1.3kg Filters: Three built-in filters: visual, infrared and dual-band Verdict: Inexpensive smart scope system ZWO SeeStar S50 Stats: 50mm aperture, 250mm focal length, apochromatic triplet lens, Sony IMX642 sensor Size: Portable device at 143 x 130 x 257mm, 2.5kg. Tripod adds 0.65kg and EPP case adds 0.6kg Filters: One built-in dual-band filter, plus one additional solar filter supplied Verdict: Inexpensive smart scope Celestron Origin Stats: 152mm aperture, 334mm focal length f/2.2 Rowe-Ackermann Schmidt design, Sony IMX178LQJ sensor Size: Tube 610 x 178mm, 4.8kg; mount 457 x 305 x 254mm, 7.7kg. Total for tripod and tube together 18.9kg Filters: Filter drawer, 1.25-inch…

As beautifully vibrant and detailed as images from Webb are, the colours are not arbitrarily chosen. They have real scientific value. The process of applying colour chromatically according to wavelength gives us more information in the final image than we would have from a single greyscale image. For example, in deep-field images littered with galaxies, colours play a vital role in giving us a visual cue to the most distant galaxies in an image. The faintest red smudges are likely very distant galaxies formed within a few hundred million years after the Big Bang. Similarly, in images of nebulae within our Galaxy, colours clue us in to the different chemical processes taking place within the nebula. We can get a sense of the distribution of different elements within the nebula…

7 January Io and its shadow virtually touch while in transit 10 January Jupiter reaches opposition, and a rare Callisto transit 20 January Comet 24P/Schaumasse passes south of Arcturus 26/27 January Callisto and its shadow transit the face of Jupiter 27 January The waxing gibbous Moon occults the northern Pleiades Aurora borealis Andrew Morkot, Gateshead, Tyne and Wear, 11 October 2024 January at a glance The new year gets off to a flying start with Jupiter reaching opposition on 10 January. Currently really well placed in Gemini, Jupiter manages a very respectable altitude of nearly 60° under dark sky conditions when due south; perfect to raise it above any low altitude atmospheric turbulence. A telescope shows lots of detail, but there are also four bright ‘Galilean’ moons to look out…

The large constellation of Draco, the Dragon wraps partly around the North Celestial Pole (NCP). Out of the 88 defined constellations, it's the eighth largest. The dragon's tail begins to the north of the Plough's blade, the body curving around the equivalent box shape in Ursa Minor, bending sharply at the border with Cepheus. It then changes direction by nearly 180°, to head towards the familiar Keystone asterism in Hercules. This faint pattern of four stars forms a shape resembling a keystone found at the top of an old stone arch, sometimes described as a lozenge. However, it's the head of Draco, which forms an asterism commonly known as the Lozenge. This faint but distinctive shape can be found to the north of the compact summer constellation of Lyra, the…

The Heart Nebula Craig Dixon, Scarborough, North Yorkshire, UK, 24 February–11 April 2025 2 August Mercury reaches greatest western elongation (morning) 12 August See a significant partial solar eclipse (evening) 12/13 August A favourable Perseid meteor shower peak 15 August The Waxing crescent Moon lies near Venus (evening) 28 August See a significant partial lunar eclipse (early morning) August at a glance Astronomical events aren't evenly spread month-bymonth across the year. August 2026 is a case in point because it has a significant amount happening. There's a binocular comet on view as well as two eclipses and perfect conditions for one of the best meteor showers of the year, the Perseids. The comet is 10P/Temple 2, which this month is passing south from eastern Capricornus into Piscis Austrinus, the Southern…

4 October Saturn reaches opposition 5 October The Moon pays Mars a close visit at dawn 10-12 October Mars crosses the Beehive Cluster 13 October Vesta reaches opposition 28 October A Lunar occultation of the Pleiades Lunar phases Richard Addis, Wallasey, Merseyside, UK, 29 April–12 May 2025 October at a glance The planets come back in force this month. Saturn reaches opposition on 4 October, shining at mag. +0.1 in northwest Cetus. A telescope view of Saturn reveals those amazing rings are now opening up to reveal their southern side following Saturn's equinox last year. Saturn at opposition is a big deal. The planet is presented at its brightest and largest when viewed through a telescope. The rings can also undergo a transformation due to the ‘opposition effect’ causing them…

1 December The Moon, Regulus, Mars and Jupiter continue their morning show 14 December A favourable Geminid meteor shower peak 24 December Tonight's full Moon is a supermoon 21 December The Northern Hemisphere's winter solstice 31 December An extreme lunar libration pushes crater Grimaldi to the edge Wolf-Rayet star WR134 Steve Leonard, Markham, Ontario, Canada, 25 April–27 June 2024 December at a glance This month, the spectacular early morning Solar System show centred around Regulus (Alpha (α) Leonis) has shifted to be visible just before midnight. Mars and Jupiter continue to form a tight pattern with the star throughout the month. The view is enhanced by the presence of a last quarter Moon in the early hours of 1 December and during the evening of 27 December. Full Moon occurs…

Many of us are inspired into astrophotography through admiring deep-sky images. Thanks to advances in camera tech, amazing astrophotos are within reach of even relatively modest setups. Great images can be achieved even with a smartphone or with a DSLR that might otherwise be going unloved. Both are an excellent gateway into astro imaging. Alternately, you can jump right in with a more specialised camera. There are many different categories of astrophotography, including widefields of the Milky Way, lunar and planetary imaging, and deep-sky imaging of objects like star clusters, nebulae and galaxies. Some cameras perform better than others across these categories, so think about what kind of photography you'd most like to do, then read on to find out how different cameras can help you reach your night-sky imaging…

M42 A classic target within the Sword of Orion, the Orion Nebula is large, detailed and bright. M31 The Andromeda Galaxy is a popular target, but smart scopes with smaller sky coverage will make you think about framing. A great introduction for those who want to hone their processing skills and try multi-image mosaics. M45 Like M31, the Pleiades open cluster, M45, is a large target, not fully covered by smaller smart scope setups. Despite this, focus on the faint and delicately laced reflection nebula around Merope. M1 The Crab Nebula is a bright supernova remnant and a great target for smart telescopes, with interesting filamentary detail and good colour. The Rosette Nebula The Rosette Nebula is too large for many smart telescopes. Highly detailed, instead use this as a…

ZWO ASI2600MC Air colour wireless smart camera Autoguiding, imaging and app control combine in one seamless package This wireless smart camera combines three elements in one compact unit: a main imaging camera, a guide camera and an astrophotography controller. At first glance, it looks like a standard deep-sky camera, which is surprisingly lightweight at just 760g. However, behind the M54 tilt plate are two CMOS sensors: an APS-C-sized 26MP ‘main capture’ sensor and a smaller 1/1.8-inch high-sensitivity sensor above it. And, at the rear of the body, there is a Wi-Fi antenna, which establishes a signal through which the ASI2600MC Air can be controlled. The only cables needed are a 12V/3A–10A DC input to power it up, and if you don't have the newer, Wi-Fi- or Bluetoothenabled kind of mount,…

Open cluster NGC 2175 Emmanuel Delgadillo, Jalisco, Mexico, 25–31 December 2024 3 February An early morning gibbous Moon narrowly misses Regulus 11 February Lunar occultation of Tau (τ) Scorpii 18 February A thin waxing crescent Moon lies between Venus and Mercury 19 February Mercury is at greatest eastern elongation (evening) 26 February The Jewelled Handle clair-obscur effect is visible on the Moon February at a glance Orion reigns supreme during February, the iconic winter constellation riding high across the southern sky early evening. Orion contains many characterful stars, the most famous of which has to be Betelgeuse (Alpha (α) Orionis, a red supergiant estimated to be around 1,000 times larger than our own Sun and a prime candidate to explode as a supernova sometime in the next 100,000 years. When…

18 April A thin waxing crescent Moon lies near Venus 20 April See Ganymede and Callisto transit events on Jupiter 20/21 April A Callisto shadow transit 22 April Peak of the Lyrid meteor shower 25 April The Plato's Hook effect is visible on the Moon Night sky over Bogenfels Vikas Chander, Bogenfels, Namibia, 24 September 2024 April at a glance With spring now well and truly underway, we have a hiatus with the planets which are all clustered too close to the Sun to be seen well. Just to illustrate this situation, four of them are gathered together with a thin 2%-lit waning crescent Moon in the morning sky on 16 April, all five objects within a 9° circle. However, the ecliptic makes a shallow angle with the eastern horizon…

Lacerta, the Lizard occupies a prominent part the sky, but there's a good chance you won't have seen or recognised it. Lacerta sits between the house-shaped constellation of Cepheus, the King and the forelegs of Pegasus, the Flying Horse. Pegasus's forelegs hang northwest (up and right) from the northwest corner of the Great Square of Pegasus, marked by mag. +2.4 Scheat (Beta (β) Pegasi). If you extend the line made from the star to the right of the W of Cassiopeia, or Segin (Epsilon (ε) Cassiopeiae) through Caph (Beta (β) Cassiopeiae) a little over the same distance again, you are in Lacerta. If you head east from Deneb (Alpha (α) Cygni) this brings you to Lacerta too. It's a ‘modern’ constellation, created by Johannes Hevelius in 1687 to represent the…

2 November See an impressive line-up in the morning sky, with Regulus, Jupiter, Mars, the waning crescent Moon and the Beehive Cluster 7 November Venus and Spica lie near the Moon in daylight 24 November Tonight's full Moon is a supermoon 25 November Uranus reaches opposition Milky Way over Utah Tomáš Slovinský, Kanab, Utah, USA, 3 April 2024 November at a glance November's nights are long and, minus the Moon, beautifully dark. Full Moon is on 24 November, a perigee full Moon, or supermoon, slightly larger and brighter than average. This means early November has the darkest skies – a great time to investigate local galaxies Andromeda, M31, its two satellite companions M32 and M110, and the Triangulum Galaxy M33. M31 is easy to locate. Extend the top edge of…

The Elephant's Trunk Nebula Simon Todd, Haywards Heath, West Sussex, September 2023–October 2024 The Perseus Cluster Overall Photons, 19 locations worldwide, 3 November 2024–31 January 2025 The Flaming Star Nebula Prabhu, Emirates Astronomical Observatory, Abu Dhabi, UAE, November 2022, April 2023 and October 2023 The Moon, comet C/2023 A3 and Mount Teide Gergely Tóth, Caldera de Taburiente, Canary Islands, Spain, 1 October 2024 Planetary nebula PuWe 1 Andrea Arbizzi, Modena, Italy, December 2024–April 2025 The Dragon's Egg Nebula, NGC 6164 Francis Bozon and Cecil Navick, captured remotely via Obstech, El Sauce Observatory, Rio Hurtado, Chile, 4 May-28 June 2025 The Dark Shark Nebula Ron Brecher, Guelph, Ontario, Canada, 23–30 July 2025 The Clamshell Nebula Nicole Poersch, Prestwick, South Ayrshire, UK, 15 September 2024–21 January 2025 Aurora borealis Alessandro Scalas, Lofoten…

Given the drama of Webb's images, it's only natural to question whether what we are seeing is real. I can answer most emphatically that everything you see in the images from Webb is 100 per cent real! Webb sees the Universe in infrared wavelengths, a kind of light that is beyond what our eyes are capable of perceiving. As image processors, we take advantage of the way our eyes see colour to translate these infrared wavelengths into colours that our eyes can perceive. It's not unlike transposing music from one octave to another. The relative pitches between notes stay the same, but overall the music shifts to either higher or lower notes. This method of colourising the data – what we refer to as representative colour – gives us a…

DISCOVER More great night sky events in BBC Sky at Night Magazine's Sky Guide each month 38 January Jupiter's bright Galilean moons 42 February A special planetary display 48 March Lunar spectacles galore 52 April The Lyrid meteor shower peaks 56 May Lunar clair-obscur effects aplenty 62 June Noctilucent cloud season begins 66 July Venus lies close to Regulus 70 August Solar and lunar eclipses 76 September Neptune at opposition 80 October Saturn at opposition 84 November A Solar System line-up 90 December The Geminid meteor shower peaks Key to monthly star charts Use this key to get the most out of each month's detailed star chart…

Despite never fully rising above the horizon in the UK, northern Scorpius can be viewed from April through to July, twilight and low altitude making it harder to see outside of this date range. Scorpius does take on a whole different appearance if you are fortunate enough to see it from more southerly latitudes, the whole form definitely reminiscent of a scorpion with a curved tail, stinger poised. In mythology, Scorpius is the nemesis of Orion. One tale tells of how the mighty hunter was a boastful soul who decreed he could kill any wild creature. This angered the Earth goddess Gaia, who sent a scorpion to teach Orion a lesson. It turned out to be a fatal one as the scorpion killed Orion. Zeus placed both Orion and the…

The Triangulum Galaxy Mauro Pea, Meire Bigorie, Piedmont, Italy, 30 November 2024–3 January 2025 1 May A Ganymede shadow transit on Jupiter 14 May See a tricky morning Moon near Saturn and Mars 19 May A waxing crescent Moon lies between bright Venus and Jupiter 23 May The Lunar X and V clair-obscur effects are visible 31 May A low-altitude ‘Blue Moon’ May at a glance May is a troublesome month for viewing the night sky. Towards the end of May, less than a month from the Northern Hemisphere's summer solstice, the skies don't get properly dark. Just to add insult to injury this year, May also contains two full Moons; on 1 May and 31 May. This will almost certainly trigger a raft of ‘Blue Moon’ references, the second…

Partial eclipse and aircraft transit Peter Phelps, Ferring, West Sussex, UK, 29 March 2025 All month Noctilucent cloud season 9 July Venus lies close to Regulus (evening) 11 July A Thin waning Moon lies close to the Pleiades at moonrise (01:30 BST (00:30 UT)) 17 July A 15%-lit waxing crescent Moon lies near Venus (evening) 21 July The Lunar X and V are visible around sunset July at a glance July is close enough to the Northern Hemisphere's summer solstice that its sky conditions are a mirror of those encountered in June. Short, nor particularly dark nights are the theme this month, but at least increasing in length. This is also the second half of noctilucent cloud (NLC) season. If present, these night shining clouds may typically be seen 90-120…

8 September The Moon occults the Beehive Cluster from 04:00 BST (03:00 UT) until dawn 14 September See a tricky lunar occultation reappearance of Venus (11:30 BST (10:30 UT)) 23 September The Northern Hemisphere's autumn equinox 26 September Neptune reaches opposition 26 September 2026's Harvest Moon is tonight Fleming's Triangle Kimberly Sibbald, Alberta, Canada, 6 July and 3–26 September 2024 September at a glance The lead constellation of autumn is Pegasus, characterised by the Great Square of Pegasus asterism. Despite its grand name, the Great Square is made up of middle brightness second and third magnitude stars. It is large though. South and east of the pattern is a region made up of sprawling constellations, lacking in strong, bright patterns. Many have connections with water, the overall name for this…

Few patterns are as easy to recognise as Cassiopeia. The familiar W-shape constellation is located sufficiently near the North Celestial Pole (NCP) to be circumpolar from the UK – it never sets. This affects the way we see the ‘W’ – only truly resembling the letter when lowest in the sky, above the northern horizon. The constellation's orientation is significant in mythology. Cassiopeia represents the Seated Queen, but she's actually chained to her throne. Legend says that the Ethiopian Queen bragged about her daughter Andromeda being more beautiful than the sea nymphs and daughters of sea god Nereus. This angered the gods, especially Poseidon, who sent the sea monster Cetus to ravage her kingdom. Cassiopeia and her husband King Cepheus were advised to sacrifice Andromeda, so they chained the princess…