Polaris
Yellow supergiant Cepheid variable · Alpha Ursae Minoris
The North Star; nearest Cepheid to Earth
Polaris sits almost directly above Earth's north pole, so it barely moves through the night while every other star wheels around it, making it the navigator's North Star. It is also the closest Cepheid variable to us, a pulsating yellow supergiant whose steady rhythm helps calibrate distances across the cosmos.
Illustration generated from temperature, not a photograph
5.4 ☉
mass (the Sun = 1)
1,259 ×
as bright as the Sun
6,015 K
surface · yellow-white star
46 R☉
radius (the Sun = 1)
433 ly
from Earth
2.0
apparent magnitude
Visible to the naked eyeno equipment needed · apparent magnitude 2.0
It pours out about 1,259 times the Sun’s light. Its light has been travelling 433 years to reach us, so you see Polaris as it was 433 years ago.
Source · Wikidata
It lives in
Milky Way
Barred spiral galaxy.
Other notable stars in the Milky Way
Eta CarinaeLuminous blue variableAlnilamBlue supergiantVY Canis MajorisRed hypergiantAlnitakHot blue supergiantDenebBlue-white supergiantMintakaHot blue giant multiple star
Stars of similar brightness
AlbireoOrange bright giant1,259 ×AchernarBlue-white main-sequence star1,076 ×AlphardOrange giant971 ×AldebaranOrange giant439 ×RegulusBlue-white main-sequence star341 ×BellatrixHot blue giant star6,397 ×
Worlds in the same direction on the sky→