Star Magnitudes Table

Astronomy

Star Magnitudes Table

This chart represents relative luminosity, the relative brightness of the planets and the brighest stars, and the relationship between visual magnitude and distance from the observer.

The chart shows the faintest star that may be seen through a given size telescope, and estimates the total number of stars that can be seen through that telescope, and how far back into time that particular telescope can see.

The visual magnitude of each planet is also given.

Relative Luminosity (x 2.512) (5th root of 100)	Visual Magnitude (apparent brightness)	Absolute magnitude = visual magnitude at 10 parsecs) (32.6 light years) Examples	Est. # of stars visible	Est. % of all stars visible	(Approximate same-luminosity) Distance in Light-Years
15 trillion	-26.8	The Sun !
6 Trillion	-26
2.5 Trillion	-25
1 Trillion	-24	This chart attempts to suggest :
399 Billion	-23	- the immense size of the universe
158 Billion	-22	- Estimated 500 billion galaxies
63 Billion	-21	- Estimated 1 sextillion stars
25 Billion	-20	- the relative power of telescopes
10 Billion	-19				0.000000001
4 Billion	-18
1.6 Billion	-17
628 Million	-16
250 Million	-15
100 Million	-14
40 Million	-13
16 Million	-12	The Moon (-12)			0.0000001
6,320,137	-11
2,515,978	-10				0.000001
1,001,584	-9
398,720	-8
158,726	-7				0.00001
63,187	-6
25,154	-5
10,014	-4	Venus - the brightest planet			0.0001
3,986	-3	Jupiter
1,587	-2	Sirius (-1.4) (Brightest star, the dog star)			8.7
632	-1	Mercury, Canopus (-0.7) (2nd brightest star)	1		1
251	0	Mars, Saturn, Arcturus (0.0) (3rd brightest star), Vega			36
100	1	Spica (1.0) (16th brightest star), Altair	10		410
40	2	Polaris (2)(North Star)			?
16	3		100
6.3	4	Andromeda Galaxy (3.5) (2 Million)			10,000
2.5	5	Hundreds visible	10³	0.01 %
1.00	6	Uranus, and Faintest star visible to naked eye.		0.01 %	100,000
0.398	7	Thousands visible	10⁴	0.02 %
0.159	8	Neptune - can't see with naked eye	10⁵	0.03 %	1 Billion
0.063	9	Faintest star visible in binoculars.		0.05 %
0.0251	10	Faintest star visible by 3" telescope.	10⁷	0.07 %	2 Billion
0.0100	11	Faintest star visible by 4" telescope.		0.11 %
0.0040	12	Faintest star visible by 6" telescope.	10⁹	0.17 %	3 Billion
0.00159	13	Faintest star visible by 8" telescope.		0.25 %
0.00063	14	Faintest star visible by 10" telescope.	10¹¹	0.37 %	4 Billion
0.00025	15	Faintest star visible by 12" telescope.		0.55 %
0.000100	16	Pluto (800 Million miles)	10¹²	0.82 %	5 Billion
0.000040	17	Faintest star visible by 16" telescope.		1.2 %
0.000016	18	Faintest star visible by 20" telescope.	10¹⁴	1.8 %	6 Billion
0.0000063	19	Faintest star visible by 24" telescope.		2.7 %
0.0000025	20	Faintest star visible by 30" telescope.	10¹⁵	4.1 %	7 Billion
0.0000010	21	Faintest star visible by 40" telescope.		6.1 %
0.00000040	22	Faintest star visible by 60" telescope.	10¹⁶	9.1 %	8 Billion
0.00000016	23	Faintest star visible by 100" telescope.		14. %
0.00000006	24	Faintest star visible by 200" telescope.	10¹⁷	20. %	9 Billion
0.000000025	25			30. %
0.000000010	26	Faintest star visible to Hubble telescope.	10¹⁸	45. %	11 Billion
	27		10¹⁹	68. %
	28	THE BIG BANG - The Beginning of Time	10²¹	100. %	13.7 Billion*
			*varies with Hubble Constant estimation

DISCLAIMER

Although the author has tried to be as accurate as possible, errors are possible.
This chart is full of estimations, not absolutes.
I could not find an online star distance table like the one above. So, I made this conversion chart, to help myself understand the relationships between star distance and relative brightness.

top of page

This Vaughns 1-Pagers Astronomy Star Magnitude Chart web page was updated on 2007-05-11.