Menu

NGC 6615 — Galaxy in Ophiuchus

Galaxy Fair (29/100)

Lenticular

Magnitude 15.0m Galaxy Ophiuchus (Oph) Visible
Star Map
+ List + Plan Star Hop

Observe

1Properties

Magnitude 15.0
Angular Size 1.4′ × 0.9′
Position Angle 170°
Distance 126.00 million ly
Galaxy Type Lenticular (S0-a)
vF, vS

Position & Identifiers

RA 18h 18m 33.5s
Dec +13° 15' 54.0"
Constellation Ophiuchus (Oph)
Catalog NGC 6615

2How easy to spot?

Sign in and configure your equipment and default location to see a personalized row.
Telescope Bortle 3 Bortle 4 Bortle 5
80mm refr. V. hard V. hard Imp.
150mm Newt. V. hard+ V. hard V. hard
C8 203mm V. hard+ V. hard+ V. hard
Easy Medium Hard Very hard Impossible

Bortle 3 = rural · 4 = outer suburbs · 5 = suburbs

Medium on Seestar S50

3Visibility

Set a location in User Settings to see visibility data.

Best season May – Jul (peak: Jun)

4 Eyepiece View

Log in to set your own equipment
125x TFOV: 0.4° Lim. mag: 13.6
N E

NGC 6615 · 1.4′×0.9′ · N up, E left

5 Best Magnification

Explore

6 Surface Brightness

7 Morphology Decoder

8 Inclination & True Shape

9 Redshift

10 Size Comparator

Discover

11

Light Travel Time Machine

12

Relativistic Travel

Nearby in the Sky

Other targets within a few degrees — pan your scope a little and keep exploring.

Visibility scores assume a 150 mm Newton at Bortle 4.

NGC 6587
Medium
Elliptical galaxy
Galaxy mag 12.1 5.7° Hercules
X Oph
Easy
Mira-type variable, range 5.9–9.2
Variable Star mag 6.40 6.6° Ophiuchus
NGC 6572
Medium+
Small bright planetary nebula
Planetary Nebula mag 9.0 6.6° Ophiuchus
Tweedledee Cluster
NGC 6633
Easy
Rich open cluster
Open Cluster mag 4.6 7.1° Ophiuchus
NGC 6501
Hard+
Bright spiral galaxy
Galaxy mag 12.3 7.4° Hercules
Show on Map

Explore Nightbase

Related knowledge, tools, and stories — no observation planning required.

William Parsons
Built the Leviathan of Parsonstown; first to resolve spiral structure of nebulae
Biography
Galaxies and the Interstellar Medium
The Hubble tuning fork, Tully-Fisher distances, metallicity, Wolf-Rayet stars, HII regions, interstellar dust, the 21-cm hydrogen line, and the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect — the working toolkit astronomers use to read galaxies and the stuff between their stars.
Article
Ophiuchus
Mythology, bright stars, and deep-sky highlights.
Constellation
}