Galaxy
NGC 5963 (NGC5963)
In Draco (Dra) • Magnitude 12.1 • 3.1 arcminutes
Open the free AstroPlanner with NGC 5963 pre-selected, scored against your telescope, location, and the live cloud forecast.
Faint spiral in Draco.
NGC 5963 at a glance
| Catalog IDs | N 5963 |
| Type | Galaxy |
| Constellation | Draco (Dra) |
| Right ascension | 15h 33m 28s |
| Declination | +56° 33' 35" |
| Apparent magnitude | 12.10 |
| Surface brightness | 24.1 mag/arcsec² |
| Angular size | 3.1 × 2.5 arcmin |
| Max altitude at 45°N | 78° |
| Best imaging months | Apr, May, Jun, Jul |
How to image NGC 5963
NGC 5963 sits in the constellation Draco at right ascension 15h 33m 28s and declination +56° 33' 35". 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, NGC 5963 needs the darkest skies you can find: surface brightness, not just apparent magnitude, drives whether it will lift out of the gradient.