Epimetheus
Trades places with Janus every four years in the only known orbital swap.
Where it is right now
Epimetheus is in Pisces, 8.97 AU away.
Computed for 2 August 2026, 21:00 UTC, and recomputed at least hourly. This page is cached, so treat the line above as accurate to the hour rather than to the second. The map shows the live position.
Position from a Kepler propagation of the published elements below, accurate to about an arcminute.
Facts
Every line carries the source it came from.
- Mean radius
- 58.2 kmSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Satellite Physical Parameters
- Orbits
- Saturn, 151,400 km out on averageSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Satellite Mean Elements
- Orbital period
- 0.70 daysSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Satellite Mean Elements
- Orbit shape
- eccentricity 0.0200, inclined 0.30 degrees to Saturn's Laplace planeSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Satellite Mean Elements
- Discovered
- 1977, 1980 by J. Fountain, S. Larson (1977), D. Cruikshank (1980)Source: NASA/JPL Planetary Satellite Discovery Circumstances
Physical size
- Mean radius
- 58.2 km
- Diameter
- 116 km across
Orbit
Elements are relative to Saturn.
- Average distance from Saturn
- 151,400 km
- Closest and furthest
- 148,372 km to 154,428 km
- Eccentricity
- 0.0200, almost circular
- Inclination to Saturn's reference plane
- 27.82 degrees
- Orbital period
- 16.7 hours
- Longitude of ascending node
- 169.80 degrees
- Argument of periapsis
- 245.90 degrees
- Mean anomaly at J2000.0
- 197.20 degrees
Family
Orbits Saturn.
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Catalog id epimetheus. 3,172 objects on the map, of which 171 are hand-authored with sourced facts.