Emission nebula
Carina Nebula (NGC3372)
In Carina (Car) • Magnitude 1.0 • 5.0 degrees
Open the free AstroPlanner with Carina Nebula pre-selected, scored against your telescope, location, and the live cloud forecast.
One of the largest and brightest Ha emission nebulae in the sky, host to Eta Carinae.
Carina Nebula at a glance
| Catalog IDs | N 3372, C 92 |
| Type | Emission nebula |
| Constellation | Carina (Car) |
| Right ascension | 10h 45m 00s |
| Declination | -59° 52' 12" |
| Apparent magnitude | 1.00 |
| Surface brightness | 12.0 mag/arcsec² |
| Angular size | 300.0 × 120.0 arcmin |
| Max altitude at 45°N | Below horizon |
| Best imaging months | Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May |
How to image Carina Nebula
Carina Nebula sits in the constellation Carina at right ascension 10h 45m 00s and declination -59° 52' 12". 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, Carina Nebula responds very well to dual-narrowband filters under city skies.