Jupiter and Neptune will share the same right ascension, with Jupiter passing 33' to the south of Neptune.
From Fairfield , the pair will become visible at around 17:38 (EDT), 29° above your south-western horizon, as dusk fades to darkness. They will then sink towards the horizon, setting at 20:58.
Jupiter will be at mag -2.2, and Neptune at mag 7.9, both in the constellation Capricornus.
The pair will be a little too widely separated to fit comfortably within the field of view of a telescope, but will be visible through a pair of binoculars.
A graph of the angular separation between Jupiter and Neptune around the time of closest approach is available here.
The positions of the two objects at the moment of conjunction will be as follows:
| Object | Right Ascension | Declination | Constellation | Magnitude | Angular Size |
| Jupiter | 21h46m10s | 14°26'S | Capricornus | -2.2 | 35"0 |
| Neptune | 21h46m10s | 13°52'S | Capricornus | 7.9 | 2"2 |
The coordinates above are given in J2000.0. The pair will be at an angular separation of 55° from the Sun, which is in Sagittarius at this time of year.
The sky on 1 Jul 2024
| The sky on 1 July 2024 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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16% 25 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
| 04 Nov 2009 | – Neptune ends retrograde motion |
| 31 May 2010 | – Neptune enters retrograde motion |
| 20 Aug 2010 | – Neptune at opposition |
| 07 Nov 2010 | – Neptune ends retrograde motion |
Image credit
The Moon in conjunction with Venus and Jupiter, with the Very Large Telescope in the foreground. Image © Y. Beletsky, ESO, 2009.