Topline<\/p>\n
There\u2019 s six-planet parade on Monday, Aug. 25, just before dawn. Saturn, Jupiter and bright Venus will dominate the scene, with Mercury putting in a fleeting appearance low in the east. Uranus and Neptune will be in the sky, but remain invisible without binoculars or a small telescope. However, time is short, with Mercury rapidly sinking into the suns\u2019 glare by next week, reducing the parade to five.<\/p>\n
Planet parade 2025: Venus, Jupiter, and Saturn shine brightest before dawn, while Mercury, Uranus, and Neptune complete the planetary line-up. (Artist\u2019s impression does not represent how the \u2018planet parade\u2019 will look!)<\/p>\n
gettyKey Facts<\/p>\n
Best seen at least an hour before sunrise, the brightest members of the planet parade will be Venus and Jupiter, which dominate the eastern sky. They will be about 12 degrees apart \u2014 about the width of an outstretched fist \u2014 and are widening slightly each morning.<\/p>\n
Saturn will shine in the southwest, higher and easier to see than Mercury, but fainter than Venus and Jupiter. The moon will not be not in the sky during the parade this week.<\/p>\n
Mercury, the smallest and hardest to find of the group, will appear just above the horizon about 45 minutes before sunrise. Find an unobstructed view toward the east for the best chance of spotting it.<\/p>\n
The \u201cSwift Planet\u201d is not easy to see because it appears below 10 degrees altitude, according to NASA<\/a>. It will remain easily visible until around Aug. 26, after which it will sink into the eastern horizon. <\/p>\n Planet-rise and planet-set times for an exact location vary, so use an online planetarium<\/a> that displays that data. The following planet parade will happen during October 2028, when five planets will be visible together, again before sunrise.<\/p>\n Looking east 45 minutes before sunrise from mid-northern latitudes on August 25, 2025, three planet are visible, with Saturn bright in the southern sky.<\/p>\n StellariumWhy It’s Not A ‘planetary Alignment’<\/p>\n You’ll hear the phrase \u201cplanetary alignment\u201d to describe the view of the planets before sunrise this August. This is incorrect. The planets don\u2019t wander randomly through space, only to align in an act if huge coincidence. Planets orbit the sun in nearly circular paths, all within the same flat plane. As seen from Earth, planets therefore appear in a line across the sky \u2014 the same line the sun takes through the sky \u2014 called the ecliptic. The moon also moves close to the ecliptic, occasionally crossing it when at new moon or full moon to cause an eclipse \u2014 hence its name. How many planets you can see at night depends on where Earth and other planets are in their orbits \u2014 not on any kind of chance alignment. <\/p>\n A partial solar eclipse is seen in San Salvador. (Photo by Camilo Freedman\/SOPA Images\/LightRocket via Getty Images)<\/p>\n SOPA Images\/LightRocket via Getty ImagesWhat\u2019s Next In The \u2018planet Parade\u2019<\/p>\n After the spectacle of August\u2019s planet parade, September brings a rich calendar of night-sky events. The month opens in style on Sept. 7 with a total lunar eclipse, visible across Asia, Africa, and western Australia, turning the full corn moon a pinkish, organgy color. On Sept. 19, Venus shines beside the star Regulus in Leo beneath a delicate crescent Moon. Two days later, a partial solar eclipse will sweep across the Pacific on the same date as Saturn reaches opposition, glowing at its brightest of 2025.<\/p>\n Further ReadingForbes\u2018Planet Parade\u2019 Myths Debunked And How To Truly See It \u2014 By A StargazerBy Jamie Carter<\/a>ForbesNASA Urges Public To Leave The City As Milky Way Appears \u2014 15 Places To GoBy Jamie Carter<\/a>Forbes9 Places To Experience The Next Total Solar Eclipse A Year From TodayBy Jamie Carter<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Topline There\u2019 s six-planet parade on Monday, Aug. 25, just before dawn. Saturn, Jupiter and bright Venus will…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":369755,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[92857,17172,55909,120081,120079,120078,3890,120082,120077,70,16,15,120083],"class_list":{"0":"post-369754","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-august-2025","9":"tag-jupiter","10":"tag-mercury","11":"tag-moon-and-planets","12":"tag-planet-alignment","13":"tag-planet-parade-2025","14":"tag-planets","15":"tag-planets-alignment","16":"tag-planets-tonight","17":"tag-science","18":"tag-uk","19":"tag-united-kingdom","20":"tag-when-full-moon"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115083848251846594","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=369754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369754\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/369755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=369754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=369754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=369754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}