Open cluster
M47 (M47)
In Puppis (Pup) • Magnitude 4.2 • 30 arcminutes
Open the free AstroPlanner with M47 pre-selected, scored against your telescope, location, and the live cloud forecast.
A bright, loose cluster visually paired with M46 just 1.5° away in the sky, yet the two clusters are very different in age and character. M47 was famously "lost" for over 200 years after Messier recorded incorrect coordinates — it wasn't properly identified until 1959.
M47 at a glance
| Catalog IDs | M47, N 2422 |
| Type | Open cluster |
| Constellation | Puppis (Pup) |
| Right ascension | 07h 36m 36s |
| Declination | -14° 28' 48" |
| Apparent magnitude | 4.20 |
| Angular size | 30.0 × 30.0 arcmin |
| Max altitude at 45°N | 31° |
| Best imaging months | Oct, Nov, Dec |
How to image M47
M47 sits in the constellation Puppis at right ascension 07h 36m 36s and declination -14° 28' 48". To frame and integrate it well, AstroPlanner will compute the optimal moonless window for tonight from your location, the field-of-view fit against your sensor and focal length, the suggested total integration time given your aperture and sky Bortle class, and a cloud-aware schedule that drops it from the plan if your nearest cloud forecast spike overlaps the best altitude window.