Emission nebula
Tarantula Nebula (NGC2070)
In Dorado (Dor) • Magnitude 7.3 • 16 arcminutes
Open the free AstroPlanner with Tarantula Nebula pre-selected, scored against your telescope, location, and the live cloud forecast.
A massive H II region in the Large Magellanic Cloud.
Tarantula Nebula at a glance
| Catalog IDs | N 2070 |
| Type | Emission nebula |
| Constellation | Dorado (Dor) |
| Right ascension | 05h 38m 42s |
| Declination | -69° 06' 03" |
| Apparent magnitude | 7.30 |
| Surface brightness | 21.9 mag/arcsec² |
| Angular size | 16.0 × 16.0 arcmin |
| Max altitude at 45°N | Below horizon |
| Best imaging months | Nov, Dec, Jan, Feb |
How to image Tarantula Nebula
Tarantula Nebula sits in the constellation Dorado at right ascension 05h 38m 42s and declination -69° 06' 03". 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. As an emission nebula, Tarantula Nebula responds very well to dual-narrowband filters under city skies.