Galaxy
Silver Needle Galaxy (NGC4244)
In Canes Venatici (CVn) • Magnitude 10.2 • 16 arcminutes
Open the free AstroPlanner with Silver Needle Galaxy pre-selected, scored against your telescope, location, and the live cloud forecast.
Nearby edge-on spiral in Canes Venatici.
Silver Needle Galaxy at a glance
| Catalog IDs | N 4244 |
| Type | Galaxy |
| Constellation | Canes Venatici (CVn) |
| Right ascension | 12h 17m 30s |
| Declination | +37° 48' 26" |
| Apparent magnitude | 10.20 |
| Surface brightness | 24.6 mag/arcsec² |
| Angular size | 16.2 × 7.2 arcmin |
| Max altitude at 45°N | 83° |
| Best imaging months | Mar, Apr, May |
How to image Silver Needle Galaxy
Silver Needle Galaxy sits in the constellation Canes Venatici at right ascension 12h 17m 30s and declination +37° 48' 26". 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 a galaxy, Silver Needle Galaxy needs the darkest skies you can find: surface brightness, not just apparent magnitude, drives whether it will lift out of the gradient.