Planetary nebula
Little Gem Nebula (NGC6818)
In Sagittarius (Sgr) • Magnitude 9.3 • 0.8 arcminutes
Open the free AstroPlanner with Little Gem Nebula pre-selected, scored against your telescope, location, and the live cloud forecast.
Bright compact planetary nebula in Sagittarius.
Little Gem Nebula at a glance
| Catalog IDs | N 6818 |
| Type | Planetary nebula |
| Constellation | Sagittarius (Sgr) |
| Right ascension | 19h 43m 58s |
| Declination | -14° 09' 12" |
| Apparent magnitude | 9.30 |
| Surface brightness | 17.4 mag/arcsec² |
| Angular size | 0.8 × 0.8 arcmin |
| Max altitude at 45°N | 31° |
| Best imaging months | Jun, Jul, Aug |
How to image Little Gem Nebula
Little Gem Nebula sits in the constellation Sagittarius at right ascension 19h 43m 58s and declination -14° 09' 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 a planetary nebula, Little Gem Nebula typically appears small and intense, so a long focal length and OIII or Ha narrowband filters bring out structure.