Mars
Half Earth's size, a third of its gravity, and the tallest volcano in the solar system.
Where it is right now
Mars is in Taurus, 1.99 AU away, magnitude 1.3.
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 astronomy-engine's VSOP87-derived series, accurate to about an arcsecond.
Facts
Every line carries the source it came from.
- Mean radius
- 3,389.5 kmSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Fact Sheet
- Year
- 687 Earth daysSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Fact Sheet
- Day
- 24 h 37 m, the closest match to Earth's in the solar systemSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Fact Sheet
- Olympus Mons
- about 22 km tall, roughly 2.5 times Everest above sea levelSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Fact Sheet
- Orbit
- 1.524 AU average, eccentricity 0.093Source: NASA/JPL Approximate Positions of the Major Planets (J2000)
- Opposition
- every 26 months, when it outshines everything but Venus and JupiterSource: NASA/JPL Planetary Fact Sheet
Physical size
- Mean radius
- 3,390 km
- Diameter
- 6,779 km across
Orbit
Elements are heliocentric, referred to the J2000.0 ecliptic.
- Average distance from the Sun
- 1.524 AU (227.9 million km)
- Closest and furthest
- 1.381 AU (206.7 million km) to 1.666 AU (249.2 million km)
- Eccentricity
- 0.0934, slightly elliptical
- Inclination to the ecliptic
- 1.85 degrees
- Orbital period
- 687.0 days
- Longitude of ascending node
- 49.56 degrees
- Argument of periapsis
- 286.50 degrees
- Mean anomaly at J2000.0
- 19.39 degrees
Family
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Catalog id mars. 3,172 objects on the map, of which 171 are hand-authored with sourced facts.