Jupiter's 11.9-year orbit around the Sun will carry it to its furthest point to the Sun – its aphelion – at a distance of 5.46 AU.
In practice, however, Jupiter's orbit is very close to circular; its distance from the Sun only varies by about 10.2% between perihelion and aphelion. This means that the difference in the amount of heat and light it receives from the Sun between aphelion and perihelion is extremely small.
Finding Jupiter
Jupiter's distance from the Sun doesn't affect its appearance. From Cambridge, at the moment of aphelion it will be visible in the evening sky, becoming accessible around 19:47 (EDT), 19° above your south-eastern horizon, as dusk fades to darkness. It will then reach its highest point in the sky at 23:46, 44° above your southern horizon. It will continue to be observable until around 04:50, when it sinks below 7° above your western horizon.
A chart of the path of Jupiter across the sky in 2005 can be found here, and a chart of its rising and setting times here.
The position of Jupiter at the moment it passes aphelion will be:
| Object | Right Ascension | Declination | Constellation | Magnitude | Angular Size |
| Jupiter | 12h47m00s | 3°20'S | Virgo | -2.4 | 43.0" |
The coordinates above are given in J2000.0.
The sky on 30 Jun 2024
| The sky on 30 June 2024 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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28% 24 days old |
All times shown in EDT.
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Source
The circumstances of this event were computed using the DE430 planetary ephemeris published by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).
This event was automatically generated by searching the ephemeris for planetary alignments which are of interest to amateur astronomers, and the text above was generated based on an estimate of your location.
Related news
| 03 Apr 2005 | – Jupiter at opposition |
| 05 Jun 2005 | – Jupiter ends retrograde motion |
| 04 Mar 2006 | – Jupiter enters retrograde motion |
| 04 May 2006 | – Jupiter at opposition |
Image credit
© NASA/Cassini