© NASA/Ricardo Nunes

Venus at greatest brightness

Dominic Ford, Editor
From the Inner Planets feed

Objects: Venus
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Venus will reach its greatest brightness in its 2025 morning apparition. It will be shining brightly at mag -4.5.

From Cambridge , this apparition will not be one of the most prominent but prominent, reaching a peak altitude of 30° above the horizon at sunrise on 1 Aug 2025.

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2025 morning apparition of Venus

22 Mar 2025 – Venus at inferior solar conjunction
24 Apr 2025 – Venus at greatest brightness
31 May 2025 – Venus at greatest elongation west
01 Jun 2025 – Venus at dichotomy
01 Aug 2025 – Venus at highest altitude in morning sky

The table below lists the altitude of Venus at sunrise over the course of the apparition. All times are given in Cambridge local time.

Date Sun
rises at
Venus
rises at
Altitude
at sunrise
Direction
at sunrise
Mag Phase
03 May 202505:3403:5318°east-4.531%
13 May 202505:2203:3519°east-4.538%
23 May 202505:1303:2020°east-4.444%
02 Jun 202505:0703:0522°east-4.350%
12 Jun 202505:0402:5223°east-4.255%
22 Jun 202505:0502:4225°east-4.260%
02 Jul 202505:0902:3427°east-4.164%
12 Jul 202505:1502:3029°east-4.168%
22 Jul 202505:2402:3030°east-4.072%
01 Aug 202505:3402:3630°east-4.075%
11 Aug 202505:4402:4730°east-4.078%
21 Aug 202505:5503:0330°east-4.081%
31 Aug 202506:0503:2228°east-4.084%
10 Sep 202506:1603:4427°east-3.987%
20 Sep 202506:2704:0725°east-3.989%
30 Sep 202506:3704:3123°east-3.991%
10 Oct 202506:4904:5520°east-3.993%
20 Oct 202507:0005:1918°east-3.994%

Altitude of Venus at sunrise

A graph of the brightness of Venus is available here.

Apparitions of Venus

04 Jun 2023 – Evening apparition
23 Oct 2023 – Morning apparition
10 Jan 2025 – Evening apparition
31 May 2025 – Morning apparition
14 Aug 2026 – Evening apparition
03 Jan 2027 – Morning apparition
21 Mar 2028 – Evening apparition

Observing Venus

Venus's orbit lies closer to the Sun than the Earth's, meaning that it always appears close to the Sun and is lost in the Sun's glare much of the time.

It is observable for a few months each time it reaches greatest separation from the Sun – moments referred to as greatest elongation. These apparitions repeat roughly once every 1.6 years.

On these occasions, Venus is so bright and conspicuous that it becomes the third brightest object in the sky after the Sun and Moon. It is often called the morning star or the evening star.

Venus's brightness

Venus's brightness depends on two factors: its closeness to the Earth, and its phase. Its phase varies depending on its position relative to the Earth. When it passes between the Earth and Sun, for example, the side that is turned towards the Earth is entirely unilluminated, like a new moon.

Conversely, when it lies opposite to the Earth in its orbit, passing almost behind the Sun, it appears fully illuminated, like a full moon. However, at this time it is also at its most distant from the Earth, so it is actually fainter than at other times.

Venus reaches its brightest when it is still a crescent – with less than half of its disk illuminated. This is because it is much closer to the Earth during its crescent phases than at other times.

As a result, during evening apparitions, Venus reaches maximum brightness a few days after it is at greatest separation from the Sun, which always coincides with it showing half-phase (dichotomy).

Conversely, during morning apparitions, Venus reaches maximum brightness a few days before it is at greatest separation from the Sun.

Venus's position

The coordinates of Venus when it reaches its greatest brightness will be:

Object Right Ascension Declination Constellation Angular Size
Venus 23h43m40s 0°44'N Pisces 40.7"
Sun 02h06m 12°50'N Aries 31'48"

The coordinates above are given in J2000.0.

The sky on 24 Apr 2025

The sky on 24 April 2025
Sunrise
05:47
Sunset
19:35
Twilight ends
21:22
Twilight begins
04:01

26-day old moon
Waning Crescent

13%

26 days old

Planets
Rise Culm. Set
Mercury 04:59 11:03 17:08
Venus 04:11 10:17 16:23
Moon 04:11 09:53 15:47
Mars 11:23 18:52 02:20
Jupiter 08:13 15:47 23:21
Saturn 04:32 10:24 16:16
All times shown in EDT.

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

02 Feb 2025  –  Venus at highest altitude in evening sky
31 May 2025  –  Venus at greatest elongation west
01 Aug 2025  –  Venus at highest altitude in morning sky
05 Jun 2026  –  Venus at highest altitude in evening sky

Image credit

© NASA/Ricardo Nunes

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Cambridge

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42.38°N
71.11°W
EST

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