The sky around NGC 7171 at true scale, north up and east left, with stars to magnitude 8 and the NGC and IC objects in the field. The circles show the field of a low-power eyepiece and of 10×50 binoculars.
NGC 7171 is a barred spiral galaxy in Aquarius, 137 million light-years away
NGC 7171 is a barred spiral galaxy in the constellation Aquarius, 137 million light-years away. It shines at magnitude 12.3 and spans 2.4′ × 1.2′ of sky, about 94,700 light-years across. It is faint: a 10-inch or larger telescope, or a camera, and it is highest in the evening sky in October.
Galaxy: a system of billions of stars, gas and dust held together by gravity, far outside the Milky Way. Spiral galaxies have a disk with arms; elliptical galaxies are smooth, round or oval swarms of older stars.
Finding NGC 7171 from Deneb Algedi
NGC 7171 lies 4.4° northeast of Deneb Algedi, the magnitude 2.9 star. Three fingers held at arm's length cover about 5°.
NGC 7171 is highest in the evening in October
The chart gives its height above the horizon at 9 pm through the year, from 60°N to 40°S. It can be seen from the whole southern hemisphere and north to about 77°N, and never sets south of 77°S.
NGC 7171 is 137 million light-years away
The light seen from NGC 7171 tonight left it about 137 million years ago, long before modern humans existed. Distance source: Cosmicflows-4 (Tully et al. 2023).
Objects within 6° of NGC 7171
31 NGC and IC objects lie within 6°. The nearest that are brighter than magnitude 12.5 or have their own page:
