Planetary alignment
What a planetary alignment really is, how tightly the naked-eye planets are grouped today and how to catch the next planet parade.
Planets never really line up: because they all orbit close to the same plane, they sometimes bunch up into a short stretch of sky. That is what the press calls an alignment or a planet parade. The shorter the arc that holds them, the more striking it looks. An arc under 60° already gives you a visible row in one night; under 40° is rare.
Today
217°
Saturn · Mars · Jupiter · Venus · Mercury
Next peak
132°
01 Jul 2028
Planets
3
New York City
Today the five naked-eye planets fit inside an arc of 217° of ecliptic longitude.
How the times change through the year
| Date | ||
|---|---|---|
| 01 Oct 2026 | 207° | Saturn · Mars · Jupiter · Mercury · Venus |
| 01 Dec 2026 | 221° | Jupiter · Mars · Venus · Mercury · Saturn |
| 01 Feb 2027 | 227° | Jupiter · Mars · Venus · Mercury · Saturn |
| 01 Apr 2027 | 164° | Venus · Mercury · Saturn · Jupiter · Mars |
| 01 Jun 2027 | 133° | Saturn · Venus · Mercury · Jupiter · Mars |
| 01 Aug 2027 | 162° | Saturn · Mercury · Venus · Jupiter · Mars |
| 01 Oct 2027 | 204° | Saturn · Jupiter · Venus · Mercury · Mars |
| 01 Dec 2027 | 207° | Jupiter · Mercury · Mars · Venus · Saturn |
| 01 Feb 2028 | 206° | Jupiter · Mercury · Mars · Venus · Saturn |
| 01 Apr 2028 | 169° | Mercury · Mars · Saturn · Venus · Jupiter |
| 01 Jun 2028 | 132° | Saturn · Mars · Venus · Mercury · Jupiter |
| 01 Aug 2028 | 135° | Saturn · Venus · Mars · Mercury · Jupiter |
See also
How these times are calculated
Planet positions come from the mean Keplerian elements published by JPL/Solar System Dynamics, valid from 1800 to 2050, with errors from 15 arcseconds for Mercury to a few arcminutes for Saturn. Checked against JPL Horizons. The visibility test is deliberately conservative: a planet counts as visible only if it climbs above 10° at some point between the end and the start of civil twilight and sits more than 15° from the Sun. Nothing here models clouds, light pollution, hills or buildings on your horizon.