Skylights: February 2026

Sun

The first sunset in the 5:00pm hour is on the 1st of February. The Sun will continue to set later than 5:00pm until October 31.

Creeping farther northward as it moves eastward along its annual trip along the ecliptic, the Sun moves out of Capricornus and into Aquarius for a 25-day trek beginning on the morning of the 16th.

The 24th brings us our first day with at least 11 hours of daylight. We continue to experience longer daylight times through October 17.

The equation of time peaks at minus 14 minutes 10 seconds on the 12th. The is the amount of time that a sundial calibrated to mean solar noon will take to indicate actual measured solar noon. When the equation of time is negative, we say that the Sun is “slow.” The most visible effect from this time discrepancy during the first few weeks of the year is the increasing rate at which sunsets become later each day, compared with how slowly the sunrises become earlier.

The Sun’s “slowness” decreases from now through April 15, when it crosses the zero line and moves into the positive (“fast”) range for a few weeks.

Moon

Early in the morning of the first, the nearly full Moon passes 2.0° west-northwest of the Beehive Cluster, Messier 44, in Cancer.

The full Snow Moon is at 5:09am on the 1st. It rises at 4:18pm, 12 minutes before sunset, transits at 18 minutes past midnight at an elevation 65.3°, and sets at 8:31am, 33 minutes after sunrise the following morning.

On the following evening, the 2nd, the 98.0% waning Moon occults Regulus. Although Regulus is a magnitude 1.4 star, the overwhelmingly bright Moon makes the event extremely difficult to observe without a telescope. The occultation begins at 8:53pm and ends 64 minutes later.

Another lunar occultation occurs on the 6th, with magnitude 4.7 χ Virginis. The sunlit limb of the 78.9% waning gibbous Moon hides the star at 3:07am, and it reappears from the dark limb at 4:22am.

On the 6th-7th, the Moon  is 1.8° south-southwest of Spica, in Virgo.

The Moon is last quarter, in Libra, at 7:43am on the 9th.

Early on the 11th, the Moon is 3.2° east-southeast of Antares, in Scorpius.

New Moon is on the 17th, at 7:01am. This is the beginning of Lunation 1276. This new Moon results in an annular eclipse, but it will only be visible in the southern Indian Ocean and Antarctica.

On the very next evening, the 18th, the 1.4-day, 2.2% crescent Moon is just 0.8° southwest of Mercury. Also look for Venus directly below the Moon by 6.7°, low on the horizon.

The 6.9% crescent Moon is near Saturn and Neptune on the 19th.

The nearly first quarter Moon has a grazing occultation of the Pleiades on the 23rd. Of the brighter members of the cluster, only magnitude 5.8 Asterope (21 Tauri) is blocked by the lunar disk, passing behind the dark limb at 10:58pm, and emerging from the sunlit limb 40 minutes later.

The Moon is first quarter at 7:27am on the 24th, in Taurus.

On the morning of the 27th, the 79.7% gibbous Moon joins Jupiter, coming to within 2.9° to the north of the giant planet just before moonset. Close passings of the Moon and Jupiter provide an opportunity to gaze upon six solar system bodies simultaneously, as Jupiter’s four Galilean satellites will all be visible until 1:02am, when Io dips into Jupiter’s shadow. Use a small telescope to capture the view of the Moon and Jupiter together, and use enough magnification to keep both objects in the same view. 

At about 9:00pm on the 27th, the waxing gibbous Moon lies along the line extending from Castor to Pollux, spaced approximately equally from Pollux as Pollux is from Castor.

Just as February began with the Moon passing the Beehive Cluster, the final evening of the month sees the 88.0% waxing Moon pass near the Beehive Cluster, M44, in Cancer, 1.9° east of it.

Mercury

February brings one of the year’s best apparitions of Mercury in the evening sky.

Look for a spectacular pairing of the 2.4% crescent Moon just 0.8° below Mercury on the 18th.

The innermost planet reaches greatest elongation of 18.1° east of the Sun on the 19th. Although this is one of the smallest possible elongations due to Mercury reaching perihelion on the same day, the ecliptic is angled sharply north relative to the celestial grid in the evening sky during this time of year, making this a rather favorable time to view the usually elusive planet. It is so favorable that the tiny planet is above the horizon outside of astronomical twilight for three evenings from the 18th to the 20th.

Mercury sets at 6:58pm on the 21st, the latest that it is visible during this apparition.

With Mercury being well above the horizon for much of the month, there will be plenty of opportunities to get a good view of the planet with a telescope.

Something to keep in mind is that when an inferior planet is at its maximum elongation, its disk is 50% illuminated, resembling a quarter Moon phase. During evening apparitions, the planet shows a gibbous phase before, and a crescent phase after its maximum elongation, respectively. Each evening, the planet’s phase wanes as the planet’s disk grows larger as it is getting closer to Earth, until it reaches inferior conjunction. Although Mercury seldom appears larger than ten arcseconds, once it reaches its 50% illumination and goes into crescent, the phase can easily be seen in a small telescope with a modest amount of magnification.

Venus

While Mercury is the celestial spotlight of the evening twilight in February, Venus, for the first time in nearly a year, regains its position as the Evening Star.

Although it remains very low throughout the month, reaching an elongation angle of no more than 13° by the end of the month, the planet’s brilliant -3.9 magnitude puts it within reach of observers with an unobstructed western horizon. 

Venus is still rather distant, at over 1.6 au, so its gibbous disk remains a rather small ten arcseconds in a telescope.

As the month progresses beyond its third week, Venus and Mercury get closer as the latter moves back towards the Sun. The two planets become as close as 4.5° on the 27th.

Mars

Mars, although it has crossed into the morning sky, is still too low and close to the Sun to be observed. Due to the position and orientation of the ecliptic angles in the pre-dawn sky, we won’t get a good look at Mars until June.

Jupiter

Jupiter is moving westward through Gemini, and is in a good position for observing all month.

During the first week of February, Jupiter forms a near-perfect line connecting Pollux, Alhena, and Betelgeuse.The exact alignment occurs on the 4th-5th.

An advantage for northern hemisphere observers of planets traversing Gemini on winter evenings is that they attain a rather high elevation, and remain well above the horizon for a considerable amount of time, unlike the horizon huggers of Scorpius, Ophiuchus, and Sagittarius. This results in their light poking through much less of our atmosphere (something referred to as airmass), making them less susceptible to distortions that often degrade viewing.

The waxing gibbous Moon joins Jupiter on the morning of the 27th.

Saturn

February is the last good month for observing Saturn, as the ringed planet approaches conjunction late in March, but you will need a clear western horizon to keep watching it.

Saturn continues to track eastward, along with Neptune, in Pisces. The two planets reach a minimum separation of just 0.8°on the 20th.

The ring inclination, which reached a minimum of less than 0.5° in November, has now opened to over 3.0°, and by month’s end will be over 4.0°, giving Saturn its more familiar appearance. 

The Moon is located nearby on the 19th, with the Earthshine-adorned 6.9% crescent, Neptune, and Saturn all along a line that is 4.2° in length.

Saturn and Neptune, which have been together in the sky for the past few months, achieve their closest distance of 0.8° on the 20th. The two planets will not be this close again until 2061, the year Halley’s Comet returns.

Uranus

Uranus, in Taurus, concludes its retrograde path on the 4th, and resumes prograde (eastward) apparent motion. You’ll then be able to notice it moving back towards 13 and 14 Tauri, the pair of 6th magnitude stars that we’ve been using as a guide to find the seventh planet.

On the 16th, Uranus reaches eastern quadrature, 90° elongation from the Sun. This means that the planet has reached its upper culmination before darkness sets in, and the peak season for observing will be coming to an end in a few weeks.

On the 23rd, the 44.2% crescent Moon, on its way to pass over the Pleiades, is 4.9° northeast of Uranus. A wide-field telescope or large binoculars should be able to collect all three in the same view.

Neptune

Our outermost planet is getting lower in the southwest during February evenings, but Neptune’s  continued proximity to Saturn results in it retaining a low level of difficulty to observe telescopically. As both planets have been relatively close over the past several months, they reach their closest, just 0.8°, on the 20th, when Saturn overtakes Neptune as both planets move eastward.

The waxing crescent Moon visits Neptune on the 19th, passing 2.9° to the north of the distant bluish planet. 

Minor Planets

February is still a good month to observe Ceres as it remains moderately high in the southwest in the hour after twilight.

Although Ceres is well over 3 au from Earth, its relatively large 950km diameter reflects enough sunlight that it remains relatively bright, compared to most other minor planets. Throughout February, it shines at magnitude 9.1, keeping it within reach of a small telescope on a dark night.

Located in Cetus until the 20th, when it crosses into Pisces, the star to guide us to the closest dwarf planet for much of February is magnitude 5.1 89 Piscium, which is located almost due west by 11.0° of Alrescha (α Piscium), the star shown as joining the two fishes in the classical constellation outline.

Located 5.0° southwest of 89 Piscium on the 1st, Ceres travels east-northeastward at about ⅓° per day. It passes just 2.3° southeast of the star by mid-month, and at the end of February it is 5.4° east of it, and 1.6° south-southeast of ν Piscium.

The magnitude 9.2 dwarf planet crosses into Pisces from Cetus on the 20th.

Vesta, which just passed conjunction late last month, is still behind the Sun and won’t be visible until it rises before morning twilight in late May.

Pluto, which also passed conjunction in January, will not be observable until April.

7 Iris is at opposition in Sextans on the 27th. The 9th magnitude asteroid can be found within a few degrees of β Sextantis throughout the month, and it gets as close as 0.4° north of the star on the 24th-25th.

Earth is closest to Iris on the 20th, at a distance at 1.5 au. 

15022 Francinejackson is in Virgo. The magnitude 19.5 asteroid is stationary on the 18th and is located just 0.6° north of Spica. It is estimated to brighten by a full magnitude when it is near opposition in early April.

Stars

Although we’re still in the midst of winter, February brings some quite noticeable changes to our sky. 

Over the course of its 28 days, we gain 64 minutes of daylight, closing the month with over eleven hours of daylight. Back at the solstice, we were deep into twilight at 5:00pm, but February begins with our first 5:00pm sunset. The angle of the midday Sun, as well as its rising and setting positions along the horizon, is changing markedly as we approach the equinox.

Cygnus, which has occupied a position in the northwestern sky during early evenings for quite some time, is finally dipping below the horizon to return to the morning sky. A fun experiment for observers with an unobstructed northern horizon is to see how late in the year the celestial swan’s brightest star Deneb remains visible in the evening sky. If conditions are right, from our latitude in Rhode Island, it can be seen several days into March.

In the west, the Great Square of Pegasus assumes a diamond orientation, with the stream of stars marking Andromeda standing straight up from Alpheratz, the uppermost star of the Square. 

In the southwest, the temporary “autumn triangle” asterism that was formed when Saturn joined Fomalhaut in Pisces Austrinus and Diphda in Cetus, has been truncated as the "loneliest" star, Fomalhaut, has now set, but another temporary formation has arisen with the expected brightening of the long-period variable Mira (omicron Ceti).

It may not be bright enough to notice at first, but if you’ve been watching the area of sky 35° due east of Saturn for a while, you just might gaze on a dark, moonless night, a part of the constellation Cetus that you may not at first recognize. For most of its 330-day period, Mira is well below naked-eye visibility, at about tenth magnitude, but it has recently brightened to its peak, and is expected to be naked-eye visible, at third magnitude, for at least part of February. Although this part of the sky is populated by dimmer stars, you may not be able to easily identify Mira at first. Another way to locate it is to draw a line between Menkar (α Ceti) and Diphda (β Ceti). Mira is ⅓ of the way along this line, or 13° southwest of Menkar.

Mira is a red giant star that has evolved beyond its helium fusion stage, and is fusing heavier elements, most notably carbon. It has a radius of about 500 suns (2.3 au), and shines with a luminosity of about 8,500 suns, much of it in the infrared. Its pulsations vary its spectral class from M5 to M9. Viewed in a telescope, Mira will appear distinctly red.

In the south, the prominent Winter Hexagon crosses the meridian much earlier in the evening, and by month’s end, it is due south immediately following twilight. This makes it a good time to explore the winter Milky Way, which stretches southward from Auriga, through the border of Taurus and Gemini, Orion, Monoceros, Canis Major, Puppis, and if you have a low southern horizon, Vela. This area of sky is rich in star clusters and even a few nebulae. Some of the lesser-observed Messier objects reside here, including M49, M50, and M93. 

In the east, the constellations of spring, including Leo and Hydra, are coming into view during the evening hours, and in the northeast, we’re still anticipating the outburst of the Blaze Star, T Coronae Borealis, to bring it into second magnitude range. Its host constellation, the Northern Crown, rises before midnight. Once you see magnitude 0.1 Arcturus in the eastern sky, Corona Borealis is visible about an hour later.

At approximately midnight in mid-February, the 10-hour line of right ascension crosses the local meridian. The most prominent feature along this line is the sickle asterism in Leo, which one can imagine as also representing a folded paper Valentine, as its stars also outline the left half of a heart shape.

Late-night observers will relish the fact that we’re also now into galaxy season, as the spring sky has us looking out through the less dense regions of our home galaxy’s north pole, giving us a good view of many of the galaxies in our cosmic neighborhood, which populates the constellations of Virgo, Leo, and Coma Berenices. The Moon is out of view during the second half of the month.