Neptune is the most distant of the gas giants in our solar system, about 2.8 billion miles from the Sun. Its magnitude ranges from about 7.8 to 8.0, and it is not hard to see with a small telescope if you use a chart to find it. At low magnification it looks like a star, but at 200x or higher its small blue-green disk can be seen. It looks similar to Uranus, but about half as large.

In this image, Neptune's largest moon, Triton, can be seen to the lower left. It is about magnitude 13.8 and can be spotted through medium or large backyard scopes. It orbits Neptune every 5.88 days.

Image details: A set of 1000 frames at 1/15-second of Neptune, and 43 2-second exposures of Triton, all at ISO 12800, taken with a Canon T6i camera through a 14" Meade 850XL telescope at f/16. 

November 14, 2022