Janus
Swaps orbits with Epimetheus every four years without either one ever colliding.
Where it is right now
Janus is in Pisces, 8.97 AU away.
Computed for 2 August 2026, 17:00 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
- 89.2 kmSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Satellite Physical Parameters
- Orbits
- Saturn, 151,500 km out on averageSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Satellite Mean Elements
- Orbital period
- 0.70 daysSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Satellite Mean Elements
- Orbit shape
- eccentricity 0.0070, inclined 0.20 degrees to Saturn's Laplace planeSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Satellite Mean Elements
- Discovered
- 1966, 1980 by A. Dollfus (1966), D. Pascu (1980)Source: NASA/JPL Planetary Satellite Discovery Circumstances
Physical size
- Mean radius
- 89.2 km
- Diameter
- 178 km across
Orbit
Elements are relative to Saturn.
- Average distance from Saturn
- 151,500 km
- Eccentricity
- 0.0070, almost perfectly circular
- Inclination to Saturn's reference plane
- 27.98 degrees
- Orbital period
- 16.7 hours
- Longitude of ascending node
- 169.85 degrees
- Argument of periapsis
- 130.76 degrees
- Mean anomaly at J2000.0
- 111.70 degrees
Family
Orbits Saturn.
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Catalog id janus. 3,172 objects on the map, of which 171 are hand-authored with sourced facts.